Chapter XI: Act IV (5)

Well, what about this Forefathers' Day? In Brooklyn they say the Landing of the Pilgrims was December the 21st; in New York you say it was December the 22d. You are both right. Not through the specious and artful reasoning you have sometimes indulged in, but by a little historical incident that seems to have escaped your attention. You see, the Forefathers landed in the morning of December the 21st, but about noon that day a pack of hungry wolves swept down the bleak American beach looking for a New England dinner, and a band of savages out for a tomahawk picnic hove in sight, and the Pilgrim Fathers thought it best for safety and warmth to go on board the Mayflower and pass the night. And during the night there came up a strong wind blowing off shore that swept the Mayflower from its moorings clear out to sea, and there was a prospect that our Forefathers, having escaped oppression in foreign lands, would yet go down under an oceanic tempest. But the next day they fortunately got control of their ship and steered her in, and the second time the Forefathers stepped ashore.

Brooklyn celebrated the first landing; New York the second landing. So I say Hail! Hail! to both celebrations, for one day, anyhow, could not do justice to such a subject; and I only wish I could have kissed the Blarney stone of America, which is Plymouth Rock, so that I might have done justice to this subject. Ah, gentlemen, that Mayflower was the ark that floated the deluge of oppression, and Plymouth Rock was the Ararat on which it landed.

But all these things aside, no one sitting at these tables has higher admiration for the Pilgrim Fathers than I have--the men who believed in two great doctrines, which are the foundation of every religion that is worth anything: namely, the fatherhood of God and the brotherhood of Man--these men of backbone and endowed with that great and magnificent attribute of stick-to-it-iveness. Macaulay said that no one ever sneered at the Puritans who had met them in halls of debate or crossed swords with them on the field of battle. They are sometimes defamed for their rigorous Sabbaths, but our danger is in the opposite direction of no Sabbaths at all. It is said that they destroyed witches. I wish that they had cleared them all out, for all the world is full of witches yet, and if at all these tables there is a man who has not sometimes been bewitched, let him hold up his glass of ice-water. It is said that these Forefathers carried religion into everything, and before a man kissed his wife he asked a blessing, and afterward said: "Having received another favor from the Lord, let us return thanks." But our great need now is more religion in every-day life.

Still, take it all in all, I think the descendants of the Pilgrim Fathers are as good as their ancestors, and in many ways better. Children are apt to be an echo of their ancestors. We are apt to put a halo around the Forefathers, but I suspect that at our age they were very much like ourselves. People are not wise when they long for the good old days.

But though your Forefathers may not have been much, if any, better than yourselves, let us extol them for the fact that they started this country in the right direction. They laid the foundation for American manhood. The foundation must be more solid and firm and unyielding than any other part of the structure. On that Puritanic foundation we can safely build all nationalities. Let us remember that the coming American is to be an admixture of all foreign bloods. In about twenty-five or fifty years the model American will step forth. He will have the strong brain of the German, the polished manners of the French, the artistic taste of the Italian, the stanch heart of the English, the steadfast piety of the Scotch, the lightning wit of the Irish, and when he steps forth, bone, muscle, nerve, brain entwined with the fibers of all nationalities, the nations will break out in the cry: "Behold the American!"

I never realized what this country was and is as on the day when I first saw some of these gentlemen of the Army and Navy. It was when at the close of the War our armies came back and marched in review before the president's stand at Washington. I do not care whether a man was a Republican or a Democrat, a Northern man or a Southern man, if he had any emotion of nature, he could not look upon it without weeping. God knew that the day was stupendous, and He cleared the heaven of cloud and mist and chill, and sprung the blue sky as the triumphal arch for the returning warriors to pass under. From Arlington Heights the spring foliage shook out its welcome, as the hosts came over the hills, and the sparkling waters of the Potomac tossed their gold to the feet of the battalions as they came to the Long Bridge and in almost interminable line passed over. The capitol never seemed so majestic as that morning: snowy white, looking down upon the tides of men that came surging down, billow after billow. Passing in silence, yet I heard in every step the thunder of conflicts through which they had waded, and seemed to see dripping from their smoke-blackened flags the blood of our country's martyrs. For the best part of two days we stood and watched the filing on of what seemed endless battalions, brigade after brigade, division after division, host after host, rank beyond rank; ever moving, ever passing; marching, marching; tramp, tramp, tramp--thousands after thousands, battery front, arms shouldered, columns solid, shoulder to shoulder, wheel to wheel, charger to charger, nostril to nostril.

Commanders on horses with their manes entwined with roses, and necks enchained with garlands, fractious at the shouts that ran along the line, increasing from the clapping of children clothed in white, standing on the steps of the capitol, to the tumultuous vociferation of hundreds of thousands of enraptured multitudes, crying "Huzza! Huzza!" Gleaming muskets, thundering parks of artillery, rumbling pontoon wagons, ambulances from whose wheels seemed to sound out the groans of the crushed and the dying that they had carried. These men came from balmy Minnesota, those from Illinois prairies. These were often hummed to sleep by the pines of Oregon, those were New England lumbermen. Those came out of the coal-shafts of Pennsylvania. Side by side in one great cause, consecrated through fire and storm and darkness, brothers in peril, on their way home from Chancellorsville and Kenesaw Mountain and Fredericksburg, in lines that seemed infinite they passed on.

We gazed and wept and wondered, lifting up our heads to see if the end had come, but no! Looking from one end of that long avenue to the other, we saw them yet in solid column, battery front, host beyond host, wheel to wheel, charger to charger, nostril to nostril, coming as it were from under the capitol. Forward! Forward! Their bayonets, caught in the sun, glimmered and flashed and blazed, till they seemed like one long river of silver, ever and anon changed into a river of fire. No end to the procession, no rest for the eyes. We turned our heads from the scene, unable longer to look. We felt disposed to stop our ears, but still we heard it, marching, marching; tramp, tramp, tramp. But hush--uncover every head! Here they pass, the remnant of ten men of a full regiment. Silence! Widowhood and orphanage look on and wring their hands. But wheel into line, all ye people! North, South, East, West--all decades, all centuries, all millenniums! Forward, the whole line! Huzza! Huzza!

THE HOLLANDER AS AN AMERICAN

Speech of Theodore Roosevelt at the eleventh annual dinner of the
Holland Society of New York, January 15, 1896.

MR. PRESIDENT, GENTLEMEN, AND BRETHREN OF THE HOLLAND SOCIETY:--I am more than touched, if you will permit me to begin rather seriously, by the way you have greeted me to-night. When I was in Washington, there was a story in reference to a certain president, who was not popular with some of his own people in a particular western state. One of its senators went to the White House and said he wanted a friend of his appointed postmaster of Topeka. The president's private secretary said, "I am very sorry, indeed, sir, but the president wants to appoint a personal friend." Thereupon the senator said: "Well, for God's sake, if he has one friend in Kansas, let him appoint him!"

There have been periods during which the dissembled eulogies of the able press and my relations with about every politician of every party and every faction have made me feel I would like to know whether I had one friend in New York, and here I feel I have many. And more than that, gentlemen, I should think ill of myself and think that I was a discredit to the stock from which I sprang if I feared to go on along the path that I deemed right, whether I had few friends or many.

I am glad to answer to the toast, "The Hollander as an American." The Hollander was a good American, because the Hollander was fitted to be a good citizen. There are two branches of government which must be kept on a high plane, if any nation is to be great. A nation must have laws that are honestly and fearlessly administered, and it must be ready, in time of need, to fight; and we men of Dutch descent have here to-night these gentlemen of the same blood as ourselves who represent New York so worthily on the bench, and a major-general of the army of the United States.

It seems to me, at times, that the Dutch in America have one or two lessons to teach. We want to teach the very refined and very cultivated men who believe it impossible that the United States can ever be right in a quarrel with another nation--a little of the elementary virtue of patriotism. And we also wish to teach our fellow citizens that laws are put on the statute books to be enforced and that if it is not intended they shall be enforced it is a mistake to put a Dutchman in office to enforce them.

The lines put on the program underneath my toast begin: "America! half brother of the world!" America, half brother of the world--and all Americans full brothers one to the other. That is the way that line should be concluded. The prime virtue of the Hollander here in America and the way in which he has most done credit to his stock as a Hollander, is that he has ceased to be a Hollander and has become an American, absolutely. We are not Dutch-Americans. We are not "Americans" with a hyphen before it. We are Americans pure and simple, and we have a right to demand that the other people whose stocks go to compose our great nation, like ourselves, shall cease to be aught else and shall become Americans.

And further than that, we have another thing to demand, and that is that if they do honestly and in good faith become Americans, those shall be regarded as infamous who dare to discriminate against them because of creed or because of birthplace. When New Amsterdam had but a few hundred souls, among those few hundred souls no less than eighteen different race stocks were represented, and almost as many creeds as there were race stocks, and the great contribution that the Hollander gave to the American people was the inestimable lesson of complete civil and religious liberty. It would be honor enough for this stock to have been the first to put on American soil the public school, the great engine for grinding out American citizens, the one institution for which Americans should stand more stiffly than for aught other.

Whenever America has demanded of her sons that they should come to her aid, whether in time of peace or in time of war, the Americans of Dutch stock have been among the first to spring to the aid of the country. We earnestly hope that there will not in the future be any war with any power, but assuredly if there should be such a war one thing may be taken for certain, and that is that every American of Dutch descent will be found on the side of the United States. We give the amplest credit, that some people now, to their shame, grudge to the profession of arms, which we have here to-night represented by a man, who, when he has the title of a major general of the army of the United States, has a title as honorable as any that there is on the wide earth. We also need to teach the lesson, that the Hollander taught, of not refusing to do the small things because the day of large things had not yet come or was in the past; of not waiting until the chance may come to distinguish ourselves in arms, and meanwhile neglecting the plain, prosaic duties of citizenship which call upon us every hour, every day of our lives.

The Dutch kept their freedom in the great contest with Spain, not merely because they warred valiantly, but because they did their duty as burghers in their cities, because they strove according to the light that was in them to be good citizens and to act as such. And we all here to-night should strive so to live that we Americans of Dutch descent shall not seem to have shrunk in this respect, compared to our fathers who spoke another tongue and lived under other laws beyond the ocean; so that it shall be acknowledged in the end to be what it is, a discredit to a man if he does not in times of peace do all that in him lies to make the government of the city, the government of the country, better and cleaner by his efforts.

I spoke of the militant spirit as if it may only be shown in time of war. I think that if any of you gentlemen, no matter how peaceful you may naturally be, and I am very peaceful naturally, if you would undertake the administration of the Police Department you would have plenty of fighting on hand before you would get through; and if you are true to your blood you will try to do the best you can, fighting or not fighting. You will make up your mind that you will make mistakes, because you won't make anything if you don't make some mistakes, and you will go forward according to your lights, utterly heedless of what either politicians or newspapers may say, knowing that if you act as you feel bound according to your conscience to act, you will then at least have the right when you go out of office, however soon, to feel that you go out without any regret, and to feel that you have according to your capacity, warred valiantly for what you deemed to be the right.

These, then, are the qualities that I should claim for the Hollander as an American: In the first place, that he has cast himself without reservation into the current of American life; that he is an American, pure and simple, and nothing else. In the next place, that he works hand in hand and shoulder to shoulder with his fellow Americans, without any regard to differences of creed or to differences of race and religion, if only they are good Americans. In the third place, that he is willing, when the need shall arise, to fight for his country; and in the fourth place, and finally, that he recognizes that this is a country of laws and not men, that it is his duty as an honest citizen to uphold the laws, to strive for honesty, to strive for a decent administration, and to do all that in him lies, by incessant, patient work in our government, municipal or national, to bring about the day when it shall be taken as a matter of course that every public official is to execute a law honestly, and that no capacity in a public officer shall atone if he is personally dishonest.

THE ADOPTED CITIZEN

Speech of Gen. Ulysses S. Grant at the 115th annual banquet of the
Chamber of Commerce of the State of New York, May 8, 1883.

MR. PRESIDENT AND GENTLEMEN OF THE CHAMBER OF COMMERCE AND GUESTS:--I am very much obliged to your president for calling upon me first, because the agony will soon be over and I shall enjoy the misery of the rest of you.

The first part of this toast--The United States--would be a voluminous one to respond to on a single occasion. Bancroft commenced to publish his notes on the History of the United States, starting even before President Lane established this Chamber, which I think was something over one hundred years ago. Bancroft, I say, commenced earlier, and I am not prepared to dispute his word if he should say that he had kept an accurate journal from the time he commenced to write about the country to the present, because there has been no period of time when I have been alive that I have not heard of Bancroft, and I should be equally credulous if President Lane should tell me that he was here at the founding of this Institution. But instead of bringing those volumes of Bancroft's here, and reading them to you on this occasion, I will let the reporters publish them as the prelude to what I am going to say.

I think Bancroft has finished up to a little after the time that President Lane established this Chamber of Commerce, and I will let you take the records of what he (Lane) has written and what he has said in their monthly meetings and publish them as the second chapter of my speech. And, gentlemen, those two chapters you will find the longest; they will not amount to much more than what I have to say taking up the subject at the present time.

But in speaking of the United States, we who are native-born have a country of which we may well be proud. Those of us who have been abroad are better able, perhaps, to make the comparison of our enjoyments and our comforts than those who have always stayed at home. It has been the fortune, I presume, of the majority here to compare the life and the circumstances of the average people abroad with ours here. We have here a country that affords room for all and room for every enterprise. We have institutions which encourage every man who has industry and ability to rise from the position in which he may find himself to any position in the land. It is hardly worth my while to dwell upon the subject, but there is one point which I notice in the toast, that I would like to say a word about--"_May those who seek the blessings of its free institutions and the protection of its flag remember the obligations they impose._" I think there is a text that my friend Mr. Beecher,[7] on the left, or my friend Dr. Newman,[8] on the right, might well preach a long sermon upon. I shall say only a few words.

We offer an asylum to every man of foreign birth who chooses to come here and settle upon our soil; we make of him, after a few years' residence only, a citizen endowed with all the rights that any of us have, except perhaps the single one of being elected to the presidency of the United States. There is no other privilege that a native, no matter what he has done for the country, has that the adopted citizen of five years' standing has not got. I contend that that places upon him an obligation which, I am sorry to say, many of them do not seem to feel.

We have witnessed on many occasions here the foreign, the adopted, citizen claiming many rights and privileges because he was an adopted citizen. That is all wrong. Let him come here and enjoy all the privileges that we enjoy, but let him fulfill all the obligations that we are expected to fulfill. After he has adopted it, let this be his country--a country that he will fight for, and die for, if necessary. I am glad to say that the great majority of them do it, but some of them who mingle in politics seem to bank largely on the fact that they are adopted citizens; and that class I am opposed to as much as I am opposed to many other things that I see are popular now.

I know that other speakers will come forward, and when Mr. Beecher and Dr. Newman speak, I hope they will say a few words on the text which I read.

OUR NAVY

Speech of Hampton L. Carson, delivered at the dinner of the Union
League, Philadelphia, April 5, 1899, in honor of Captain Charles E.
Clark, U. S. N., late Commander of the battleship "Oregon."

MR. PRESIDENT AND GENTLEMEN OF THE UNION LEAGUE:--It was my good fortune, some eighteen months ago, to be in the city of Seattle, when the "Monterey" was lying in the harbor under the command of Captain Clark. At the time of my visit clear skies, placid waters and silent guns gave little indication of the awful responsibility that was soon to be imposed upon the gallant commander. My boys, having met him, were, like myself, intensely interested in the outcome of his voyage; and I can say to him that the pulsations of the engines which drove the _Oregon_ through fourteen thousand miles of tropic seas were accompanied by the sympathetic beatings of hearts which had learned to love and respect this great captain as he richly deserved.

The American Navy! The most concise tribute that I ever heard paid to the sailors of the United States was contained in the answer of a man from Indiana, who was an applicant for office under General Grant, just after the Civil Service rules had gone into operation. The applicant was apprehensive as to his ability to respond to the questions, but one of his answers captured the board of examiners as well as the president, and he secured the place. The question was, "How many sailors did Great Britain send here, during the war of the Revolution, for the purpose of subduing us?" and the answer was, "More by a----sight than ever got back."

When Louis XIV, in order to check what he perceived to be the growing supremacy of England upon the seas, determined to establish a navy, he sent for his minister Colbert, and said to him, "I wish a navy--how can I create it!" Colbert replied, "Make as many galley slaves as you can." Thereupon every Huguenot who refused to doff his bonnet on the street as the king passed by, every boy of seventeen who could give no account of himself, every vagrant without an occupation, was seized, convicted, and sent to the galleys. Could a navy of heroes be made of galley slaves! The history of the Anglo-Saxon race says "No."

On the twenty-second day of December, 1775, the navy of the United States was born on the waters of our Delaware. On that day Esek Hopkins, of Rhode Island, was placed in command of a little fleet of eight vessels--two of them ships, two of them brigs, the others very much smaller. The English officers sneered in derision at "the fleet of whaleboats." The rattlesnake flag--a yellow flag with a pine tree in the centre and a rattlesnake coiled beneath its branches, with the words "Don't tread on me"--was run to the masthead of the _Providence_, being hauled there by the hands of the first lieutenant, John Paul Jones. That little fleet of eight vessels, mounting only 114 guns, was sent forth to confront a naval power of 112 battleships with 3,714 guns--not a single gun of ours throwing a ball heavier than nine pounds, while five hundred of the English guns threw a weight of metal of double that amount. Wasn't it an audacious thing? Why, it seems to me one of the marvels of human history when I reflect upon what was attempted by the Americans of 1776.

Look at the situation. Thirteen different colonies strung along a narrow strip of coast; three thousand miles of rolling ocean on the one side and three thousand miles of impenetrable wilderness on the other; colonies with infinite diversity of interests--diverse in blood, diverse in conditions of society, diverse in ambition, diverse in pursuits--the English Puritan on the rock of Plymouth, the Knickerbocker Dutch on the shores of the Hudson, the Jersey Quaker on the other side of the Delaware, the Swede extending from here to Wilmington, Maryland bisected by our great bay of the Chesapeake, Virginia cut in half by the same water way, North Carolina and South Carolina lying south of impenetrable swamps as inaccessible to communication as a range of mountains, and farther south the sparsely-settled colony of Georgia. Huguenot, Cavalier, Catholic, Quaker, Dutchman, Puritan, Mennonite, Moravian, and Church of England men; and yet, under the hammer stroke of British oppression, thirteen colonies were welded into one thunderbolt, which was launched at the throne of George III.

That little navy under Hopkins--where were those sailors bred? Read Burke's speech on the conciliation of America. They sprang from the loins of hardy fishermen amidst tumbling fields of ice on the banks of Newfoundland, from those who had speared whales in the tepid waters of Brazil, or who had pursued their gigantic game into the Arctic zone or beneath the light of the Southern Cross. That fleet of eight ships sailed from the Delaware on the twenty-second of December, 1775, and proceeded to the island of New Providence, among the Bahamas. Our colonies and our armies were without arms, without powder, without munitions of war. The very first exploit of the fleet was the capture, on the nineteenth of March, 1776, of 150 cannon, 130 barrels of powder and eight warships, which were carried in triumph into Long Island Sound. But what of American heroism when the soldiers of Howe, of Clinton, of Carleton, and of Gage came here to fight the farmers of Pennsylvania, of Connecticut and Virginia, and the gay cavaliers who loved adventure? The British soldiers had conquered India under Sir Robert Clive and Sir Eyre Coote; they had been the heroes of Plassey and Pondicherry; men who had subjected to British dominion a country almost as extensive as our own fair republic and containing one hundred and ninety millions of souls. Here they found themselves faced by men of their own blood, men in whose breasts burned the spirit and the love of that liberty which was to encircle the heavens. On the glory-crowned heights of Bunker Hill the patriots gazed at the rafters of their own burning dwellings in the town of Charlestown, and heard the cannon shots hurled from British ships against the base of the hill. Three times did scarlet regiments ascend that hill only to be driven back; the voice of that idiot boy, Job Pray, ringing out above the din of battle, "Let them come on to Breed's--the people will teach them the law."

When the evacuation by the British of the metropolis of New England was effected by the troops under the command of a Virginia soldier, General Washington, then for the first time did sectionalism and partisanship and divisions on narrow lines vanish; the patriots who had fought at Bunker Hill were now no longer to be known as the troops of Massachusetts, of Connecticut, or of Rhode Island, but henceforth it was the Continental Army. On the very day when the British were driven out of Boston, John Paul Jones, with that historic rattlesnake flag, and, floating above it, not the Stars and Stripes, but the Stripes with the Union Jack, entered the waters of Great Britain; and then it was seen that an American captain with an American ship and American sailors had the pluck to push out into foreign seas and to beard the British lion in his den. The same channel which had witnessed the victories of De Ruyter and Von Tromp, which was the scene of Blake's victory over the Dutch, and where the father of our great William Penn won his laurels as an admiral, was now the scene of the exploits of an American captain fighting beneath an American flag for American rights inherited from old mother England, who, in a moment of forgetfulness, had sought to deprive her offspring of liberty. I know of no more thrilling incident in revolutionary naval annals than the fight between the _Serapis_ and the _Bon Homme Richard_, when Paul Jones, on the burning deck of a sinking ship, lashed his yard arms to those of the enemy and fought hand to hand, man to man, until the British colors struck, and then, under the very cliffs of Old England, were run up for the first time the Stars and Stripes--with a field of blue into which the skillful fingers of Betsy Ross, of Philadelphia, had woven inextinguishable stars; the red stripes typifying the glory, the valor, and the self-sacrifice of the men who died that liberty might live; and the white, emblematic of purity, fitly representing those principles to preserve which these men had sanctified themselves by an immortal self-dedication. And there, too, in the Continental Navy was Richard Dale, the young "Middy," who fought beside Paul Jones; and Joshua Barney; and John Barry; and Nicholas Biddle of Philadelphia, who later, in the gallant little _Randolph_, in order to help a convoyed fleet of American merchantmen to escape, boldly attacked the battleship _Yarmouth_; and when it was found that he was doomed to defeat, blew up his vessel, perishing with all his crew, rather than strike the colors of the newly-born republic.

All honor to the navy of the United States! I never can read of its exploits--peaceful citizen as I am--without my blood bubbling with a joyous sense of exultation at the thought that the flag which has swept the seas, carrying liberty behind it, is the flag which is destined to sweep the seas again and carry liberty, civilization, and all the blessings of free government into benighted islands far, far from hence.

Why, gentlemen, the story of the exploits of our little fleets reads like a romance. At the end of the Revolutionary War eight hundred British ships, fifteen of them battleships, had surrendered to the prowess of the American navy, together with twelve thousand five hundred prisoners captured by less than three thousand men; and in that war our country had produced the boldest admirals that, up to that time, civilization had known, and the greatest fighting naval heroes that the world had seen.

Then came the War of 1812, to establish sailors' rights upon the high seas, when the American navy again proved victor despite overwhelming odds. I have in my possession a list of the British and American vessels at the outbreak of that war; and if I were to represent them by something tangible in order to indicate the proportions of each, I would say, taking this box lid for example (illustrating with the stem of a rose upon the cover of a discarded flower box), that if you were to draw a line across here, near the top, you would have sufficient space in the narrow strip above the dividing line to write the names of all the American ships, while the entire remaining space would not be more than sufficient for the English fleet, which was more than thirty times the size of its antagonist. The ships which under Nelson had fought at the Nile and had won imperishable glory at Trafalgar, coming into our waters, struck their flags time and again. The glorious old "Ironsides" (the _Constitution_) captured the _Guerriere_, the _Java_, the _Cyane_, and _Levant_. The _United States_ took the _Macedonian_; the _Wasp_ destroyed the _Frolic_, while on the lakes we point with pride to the victories of Perry and MacDonough. When battle after battle had been fought it was found that, of eighteen fixed engagements, seventeen were victories for the Stars and Stripes. And this over the greatest maritime war power of the world!

Philadelphia is honorably associated with the glories of our navy. Our early battleships, though not all built here, were planned and constructed by Joshua Humphreys, a Philadelphian, the predecessor of our great shipbuilder of to-day, Charles H. Cramp.

Need I speak of the navy from 1861 to 1865, or tell of the exploits of those gallant fleets which clove a pathway down the valley of the Ohio, of the Tennessee, and of the Mississippi, in order that liberty might ride unvexed from the lakes to the gulf? Need I dwell upon the part taken by the guest of this evening, who was an officer who fought under Farragut?

In our recent war with Spain there were some who, in doubting moments, yielded to that atrabilious disposition which has been so well described by Mr. Tomkins; who thought that our ships were not strong enough to hazard an encounter with the fleets of Spain. But meanwhile there was doubling "around the Horn" a battleship, with a captain and a crew whose marvelous voyage was attracting the eyes of the world. Night after night we took up the map, traced his course from port to port, and our hearts beat high, our lips were firmly compressed, the color faded from our cheeks with excitement, but our eyes blazed with exultant anticipation as nearer and nearer to Pernambuco did he come. We all now feel, judging of the possibilities by actual achievement, that had Captain Clark encountered the enemy's ships, he could and would have successfully fought and defeated the entire Spanish fleet. He carried his ship ready for instant actions, every man at his post. God bless that crew! God bless those stokers, far down below those decks, confident that the captain who commanded them was on the bridge, and that he would never flinch nor fail in the hour of trial! I have often tried to draw a mental picture of what the scene must have been when the _Oregon_ steamed in to join the fleet before Santiago; when the white jackets on the yard-arms tossed their caps in the air, and southern tars gave back to Yankee cheers a lusty welcome to the man who for so long, against all odds, with no encouraging advices, with unknown terrors all about him, had never flinched from duty, and who, when the last summons came, responded in the words of Colonel Newcomb, _Adsum_--"I am here."

On the morning of the third of July, 1898, there stood the frowning Morro Castle, the prison of the glorious Hobson; on the other side the fortress of Estrella; the narrow channel blocked by the wreck of the _Merrimac_; the _Brooklyn_, the _Oregon_, the _Texas_, the _Indiana_, the _Iowa_ and the _Massachusetts_ all watching that orifice. Then black smoke rolled from the tunnels of the enemy's ships, indicating that the tiger had roused him from his lair and was making a rush for the open sea. Up went the signal on the flagstaff of the _Brooklyn_, "Forward--the enemy is approaching." Then engines moved; then guns thundered their volleys; then sky and sea became black with the smoke of battle; and swiftly steamed the _Oregon_ in pursuit of the _Cristobal Colon_. Beneath well-directed shots the monster reeled, like a wounded athlete, to the beach; and then from the flagstaff of the _New York_ were displayed those signals now on these walls before your eyes--"1-7-3; cornet; 2m-9m-7m"--which, translated, meant--and we of the League to-night repeat the words--"Well done, _Oregon_."

Captain Clark, the city of Philadelphia has always contributed her share to the building of the navy and to a fitting recognition of the heroes who have commanded our battleships. In the old churchyard of St. Mary's, on Fourth Street, sleep the bones of John Barry; and in the older churchyard of St. Peter's stands the monument to Decatur. We have with us also the ashes of Stewart, who commanded "Old Ironsides" when she captured the _Cyane_ and the _Levant_; and we have those of Bainbridge, who captured the _Java_.

In reading of the exploits of the master spirits of the past, I have sometimes wondered whether we had men of to-day who were their equals. My answer is this: I say to soldiers and sailors, whether of our Civil War or of the late war with Spain, you are worthy of your sires, you have caught the inspiration of their glowing deeds, you have taken up the burden which they threw upon your shoulders, and though in time to come you may sleep in unmarked graves, the memory of your deeds will live; and, like your sires, you have become immortal.

To fight for liberty is indeed a privilege. "Disguise thyself as thou wilt, still, Slavery, thou art a bitter draught; and, though thousands in all ages have been made to drink thee, thou art no less bitter on that account. 'Tis thou, O Liberty! thrice sweet and gracious goddess, whose taste is grateful, and ever will be so till nature herself shall change. No tint of words can spot thy snowy mantle, nor chemic power turn thy scepter into iron. With thee to smile upon him, as he eats his crust, the swain is happier than the monarch from whose courts thou art exiled." So wrote Laurence Sterne.

And then Rufus Choate: "To form and uphold a state, it is not enough that our judgments should believe it to be useful; the better part of our affections should feel it to be lovely. It is not enough that our arithmetic should compute its value and find it high; our hearts should hold it priceless--above all things rich and rare--dearer than health and beauty, brighter than all the order of the stars." In contemplating those mysterious dispensations of Providence by which the light which broke upon this continent two hundred years ago is now penetrating and illuminating the darkest corners of the earth, it will be a supreme satisfaction for us to know that our children and our children's children will have set for their imitation and encouragement the example of the heroism, the manliness, the courage, the patriotism and the modesty of the captains of to-day.

THE PATRIOTISM OF PEACE

Address by William Jennings Bryan delivered in London, in the Royal
Gallery of the House of Lords, on July 26, 1906, at the session of
the Interparliamentary Union or Peace Congress. It is given here by
special permission of Mr. Bryan and his publishers--Funk and
Wagnalls Company, New York and London.

I regret that I cannot speak to you in the language which is usually employed in this body, but I know only one language, the language of my own country, and you will pardon me if I use that. I desire in the first place to express my appreciation of the courtesy shown me by Lord Weardale, our president, and by Baron von Plener, the chairman of the committee which framed the model treaty. The latter has framed this substitute embodying both of the ideas (investigation and meditation) which were presented yesterday. I recognize the superior wisdom and the greater experience of this learned committee which has united the two propositions, and I thank this body also for the opportunity to say just a word in defense of my part of the resolution. I cannot say that it is a new idea, for since it was presented yesterday I have learned that the same idea in substance was presented last year at Brussels by Mr. Bartholdt, of my own country, who has been so conspicuous in his efforts to promote peace, and I am very glad that I can follow in his footsteps in the urging of this amendment. I may add also that it is in line with the suggestion made by the honorable prime minister of Great Britain, Sir Henry Campbell-Bannerman, in that memorable and epoch-making speech of yesterday, in that speech which contained several sentences any one of which would have justified the assembling of this Interparliamentary Union--any one of which would have compensated us all for coming here. In that splendid speech he expressed the hope that the scope of arbitration treaties might be enlarged. He said:

"GENTLEMEN, I fervently trust that before long the principles of
arbitration may win such confidence as to justify its extension to
a wider field of international differences. We have already seen
how questions arousing passion and excitement have attained a
solution, not necessarily by means of arbitration in the strict
sense of the word, by referring them to such a tribunal as that
which reported on the North Sea incident; and I would ask you
whether, it may not be worth while carefully to consider, before
the next Congress meets at The Hague, the various forms in which
differences might be submitted, with a view to opening the door as
wide as possible to every means which might in any degree
contribute to moderate or compose such differences."

This amendment is in harmony with this suggestion. The resolution is in the form of a postscript to the treaty, but like the postscripts to some letters it contains a very vital subject--in fact, I am not sure but the postscript in this case is as important as the letter itself, for it deals with those questions which have defied arbitration. Certain questions affecting the honor or integrity of a nation are generally thought to be outside of the jurisdiction of a court of arbitration, and these are the questions which have given trouble. Passion is not often aroused by questions that do not affect a nation's integrity or honor, but for fear these questions may arise arbitration is not always employed where it might be. The first advantage, then, of this resolution is that it secures an investigation of the facts, and if you can but separate these facts from the question of honor, the chances are 100-to-1 that you can settle both the fact and the question of honor without war. There is, therefore, a great advantage in an investigation that brings out the facts, for disputed facts between nations, as between friends, are the cause of most disagreements.

The second advantage of this investigation is that it gives time for calm consideration. That has already been well presented by the gentlemen who has preceded me, Baron von Plener. I need not say to you that man excited is a very different animal from man calm, and that questions ought to be settled, not by passion, but by deliberation. If this resolution would do nothing else but give time for reflection and deliberation, there would be sufficient reason for its adoption. If we can but stay the hand of war until conscience can assert itself, war will be made more remote. When men are mad they swagger around and tell what they can do; when they are calm they consider what they ought to do.

The third advantage of this investigation is that it gives opportunity to mobilize public opinion of the compelling of a peaceful settlement and that is an advantage not to be overlooked. Public opinion is coming to be more and more a power in the world. One of the greatest statesmen of my country--Thomas Jefferson, and if it would not offend I would say I believe him to be the greatest statesman the world has produced--said that if he had to choose between a government without newspapers and newspapers without a government, he would rather risk the newspapers without a government. You may call it an extravagant statement, and yet it presents an idea, and that idea is that public opinion is a controlling force. I am glad that the time is coming when public opinion is to be more and more powerful; glad that the time is coming when the moral sentiment of one nation will influence the action of other nations; glad that the time is coming when the world will realize that a war between the two nations affects others than the nations involved; glad that the time is coming when the world will insist that nations settle their differences by some peaceful means. If time is given for the marshaling of the force of public opinion peace will be promoted. This resolution is presented, therefore, for the reasons that it gives an opportunity to investigate the facts, and to separate them from the question of honor, that it gives time for the calming of passion, and that it gives time for the formation of a controlling public sentiment.

I will not disguise the fact that I consider this resolution a long step in the direction of peace, nor will I disguise the fact that I am here because I want this Interparliamentary Union to take just as long a step as possible in the direction of universal peace. We meet in a famous hall, and looking down upon us from these walls are pictures that illustrate not only the glory that is to be won in war, but the horrors that follow war. There is a picture of one of the great figures in English history (pointing to the fresco by Maclise of the death of Nelson). Lord Nelson is represented as dying, and around him are the mangled forms of others. I understand that war brings out certain virtues. I am aware that it gives opportunity for the display of great patriotism; I am aware that the example of men who give their lives for their country is inspiring; but I venture to say there is as much inspiration in a noble life as there is in a heroic death, and I trust that one of the results of this Interparliamentary Union will be to emphasize the doctrine that a life devoted to the public, and ever flowing, like a spring, with good, exerts an influence upon the human race and upon the destiny of the world as great as any death in war. And if you will permit me to mention one whose career I watched with interest and whose name I revere, I will say that, in my humble judgment, the sixty-four years of spotless public service of William Ewart Gladstone will, in years to come, be regarded as rich an ornament to the history of this nation as the life of any man who poured out his blood upon a battlefield.

All movements in the interest of peace have back of them the idea of brotherhood. If peace is to come in this world, it will come because people more and more clearly recognize the indissoluble tie that binds each human being to every other. If we are to build permanent peace it must be on the foundation of the brotherhood of men. A poet has described how in the Civil War that divided our country into two hostile camps a generation ago--in one battle a soldier in one line thrust his bayonet through a soldier in the opposing line, and how, when he stooped to draw it out, he recognized in the face of the fallen one the face of his own brother. And then the poet describes the feeling of horror that overwhelmed the survivor when he realized that he had taken the life of one who was the child of the same parents and the companion of his boyhood. It was a pathetic story, but is it too much to hope that as years go by we will begin to understand that the whole human race is but a larger family?

It is not too much to hope that as years go by human sympathy will expand until this feeling of unity will not be confined to the members of a family or to the members of a clan or of a community or state, but shall be world-wide. It is not too much to hope that we, in this assembly, possibly by this resolution, may hasten the day when we shall feel so appalled at the thought of the taking of any human life that we shall strive to raise all questions to a level where the settlement will be by reason and not by force.

A PLEA FOR UNIVERSAL PEACE

The following extracts are from an address delivered by George W.
Norris, United States senator from Nebraska, at Chautauquas and on
lecture courses throughout the country for several years. It is one
of the most logical and practical plans for universal peace ever
proposed. It was prepared when the civilized world was at peace
immediately following the peace treaty between Russia and Japan.
David Starr Jordan declares that "military efficiency" is the
principal cause of the present European war. A serious and honest
study of how to preserve peace and how to avoid war cannot help but
bring good results. This is the purpose of Senator Norris's
lecture. For a further study of this most important subject, the
reader is referred to Sumner's great oration on "The True Grandeur
of Nations," to various speeches and monographs by Andrew Carnegie,
and to numerous other publications, recently issued, regarding the
patriotism of peace.

The greatest disgrace of the present century is that war between civilized nations is still a possibility. That such a barbarous condition should exist in the civilized world is painful to every lover of humanity and to every believer in the great brotherhood of man.

Every civilized country of the world requires its subjects to submit their differences and disputes to tribunals and courts that have been organized under the forms of law for their settlement and yet these same nations violate the principle of law which they compel their subjects to obey. The citizen must maintain his rights and settle his grievances before tribunals organized according to law, upon principles of justice and of right. Kings and rulers settle their disputes upon the field of battle without regard to right, without regard to justice, and upon the erroneous and barbarous theory that might makes right. It is to be regretted that the great advance that has been made from barbarism by the different nations of the world by which the disputes and controversies arising within each nation are settled according to forms of law upon the principles of justice and equality, has not extended to the settlement of disputes between the nations themselves. Why is it that rulers, who are able to settle all controversies within the countries they control are not able to settle controversies between those countries?

Humanity is broader than nationality and embraces within its scope the entire world. The measure of human happiness will not be full, the heights of national glory will not be reached until we can look over the world and in the words of the scripture, truthfully say of every citizen of every civilized nation--"Is he not after all, my brother?"

Why then should there be war? I know that it can truthfully be claimed that this cruel and heartless demon has settled many questions of world-wide importance, but it never settled one on any principle of equity, morality, or justice. In modern times its decree has been more often right than wrong, because the great spirit of public sentiment when once aroused has not only furnished money and men for the right, but it has thoroughly imbued the hearts of its soldiers with a determination and a bravery that have done much to place the victory where it properly belonged. But what a sacrifice of human life and treasure. I do not want to be understood as claiming that all the wars of history were wrong or could have been avoided. Some of them were carried on for liberty, some were waged for mercy and some were fought for humanity. The soldier, not only of our own land, but of other countries as well, is entitled to all the consideration and all the honor and glory that humanity can give or bestow. I am however proclaiming against the conditions existing in modern civilized times that make war not only sometimes necessary, but at any time possible.

But the question recurs again--what is a practical way to solve the difficulty? Who shall take the first step? Who can take the first step with the assurance that beneficial results will follow? What nation to-day occupies such a unique position in civilization that it can step out into the open and say to all the civilized world--"We are willing to submit to peaceful arbitration every international dispute, every international controversy not only of the present but of the future as well." What nation in assuming this position can command not only the respect and belief of other nations in the integrity and the honesty of its purpose, but can also receive the respect and approval of humanity's peace loving sentiment, that will go far towards impelling the balance of the civilized world to accept the proffered hand of universal brotherhood!