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There was a profound silence. Then our hostess, evidently taking us for tongue-tied country people, went on making conversation with a vague, fluent, somewhat absent-minded kindness. "It's very pleasant to be here again. I stayed here once a few weeks, many years ago, when I was young. We had quite a jolly time. I remember then there was a boy here-perhaps a young man a slim, dark, tall fellow, with the most perfect early Renaissance head imaginable, quite like the 'Jeune Homme Inconnu.' I've been trying all day to remember his name. Paul? No. Walter? It had two syllables, it seems to me. Well, at any rate, he had two great beauties-the pale, flat white of his skin and his great shaggy mass of dark hair. I've often 'used his hair in drawings since. But I don't suppose he looks like that now." Flossie spoke. She spoke with the effect of a revolver

discharging a bullet. "Oh, yes, he does! He looks exactly like that still, only more mature, more interesting," she said in an angry, defiant tone.

"Ah, indeed," said the painter, with an accent of polite acquiescence. She sighed now, and looked at the clock. I rose, and said, since we could not be of use to her, we would leave her to rest.

She accompanied us to the door pleasantly enough, with the professional, impersonal courtesy of a celebrity.

Outside Flossie sprang to her car, leaving me stranded on the sidewalk. She looked furiously angry. "I must get Peter away!" she said between her teeth.

"But not now, surely!" I cried. "Now more than ever," she flung back at me as she whirled the car around.

Then, as I stood open-mouthed, utterly at a loss, she drove the car close to the curb and, leaning to my ear,

whispered fiercely, "You don't suppose I'll let her see how he looks now!"

Miss Arling was gone before they returned from the two-day fishing trip on which they started that night. I doubt if Peter ever heard that she had been in town.

The morning after their return, as soon as Peter had gone downtown, Flossie tore down the big photograph from the wall and flung it into the garbage

can.

I noticed its absence, some days later, when I went over to see them, and asked, with a little apprehension, "What did Peter say when he found it gone?"

The strangest expression came into her face. She said in a low tone, "He has never even missed it," and then she began to cry. As I looked at her I saw that she had suddenly begun to show her age.

THE SPEECH THAT WON THE
THE EAST
EAST FOR
FOR LINCOLN

T

BY GEORGE HAVEN PUTNAM

HE address delivered by Lincoln at Cooper Union on February 27, 1860, in response to the invitation of certain representative New Yorkers, was, as well in its character as in its results, the most important of all of Lincoln's utterances. Bearing in mind the weighty matters considered and the fact that it was through this address that Lincoln became President, it may not be an exaggeration to refer to it as the most important political address given in the history of the country.

The way in which this address came to be made is probably not well understood by the citizens of the present generation. The Republican party, the organization of which dates back to a meeting in Michigan in 1854, had at the time of the nomination of Lincoln made one Presidential campaign. It had not succeeded in electing Fremont (and it is probable that the failure of Fremont, who did not possess the qualifications required for leadership, was in the end of service to the Republic, but the campaign gave evidence that the fight that the new party was making against the extension of slavery and for the purpose of making sure that slavery should not be permitted to become a National institution, had won the sympathy and the support of the great mass of the voters of the North and of a substantial proportion also of the citizens of the border States.

The man who had been most generally accepted as the leader of the new party was William H. Seward, of New York. Seward's scholarly training and political experience entitled him to be classed as a statesman. He had made clear a courageous expression of the principles on which the Republican party was to make its fight. While his chief support naturally lay in the East

ern States, he had secured a National reputation. There could be no question on the part of the Republican managers in New York that the delegation sent by the State to the National Convention to be held in Chicago in June was to be instructed for Seward.

Mr. Bryant, whose reputation as a poet may have caused the present generation to overlook the fact that he was also a great editor and a patriotic and unselfish leader of public opinion, brought together early in February, 1860, in his office a group of citizens, of whom my father was one. Bryant was anxious in regard to the action of the coming Convention. He emphasized the fact that it was essential to secure as a leader in the campaign and to carry out the grave responsibilities of the Presidency a man who should not only possess the necessary individual qualifications, but who would be in a position to secure acceptance as a candidate and support as a President of all groups of loyal citizens throughout the country. Bryant was troubled lest the delegates from the Western States might not be prepared to accept an Eastern candidate. There was, as he pointed out, the risk, if the nomination did not come to Seward, that it might, as a result of some ill-considered phase of opinion or rush of suggestions, select some candidate who would not meet the very exceptional requirements. It was Bryant's recommendation that the New York delegation should receive instructions not only for a first but for a second choice. It was his further opinion that if Seward could not be nominated it would be necessary to aecept some candidate from the West, and he suggested that this young lawyer in Illinois, who had in his debates with Douglas shown an exceptional grasp of the grave issues pending and a power

to influence public opinion, might very possibly prove to be the best man for the purpose if Seward could not be secured. Bryant reminded his friends that he had printed in the "Evening Post" a full report of the Lincoln-Douglas Debates, and he said that these debates had given him a very high opinion of the clear-sightedness, patriotism, and effective force of the young lawyer. He suggested that they had better send an invitation to Lincoln to give an address in New York in order that they might secure a personal impression of the man and of his methods. The men whom Bryant called together were fully in accord with him, first, as to the desirability of nominating Seward if possible and, second, as to the importance of instructing the delegation for a second choice. They were quite prepared to meet Mr. Bryant's suggestion that the invitation should be accompanied by a check for expenses. "Young lawyers in Illinois were not likely," suggested a lawyer who was present, "to have surplus funds available."

Years after the war, I heard from Robert Lincoln that his father had in January been planning to make a trip Eastward to see the boy, who was then at Phillips Exeter Academy. His father wrote to Robert that he had just won a case and that as soon as his client B. made payment he would arrange for the trip. A week or more later Lincoln wrote again to the boy, expressing his disappointment that the trip would have to be postponed.

"B. cannot pay me for some time," said Lincoln, "and I have at this time no other money.”

A week later Lincoln wrote again to his son, reporting that he was coming, after all. "Some men in New York," he said, "have asked me to come to speak

[graphic][merged small]

ABRAHAM LINCOLN ON THE DAY OF HIS FAMOUS SPEECH AT COOPER
INSTITUTE, NEW YORK CITY

This photograph was made by M. B. Brady, in New York, February 27, 1860. This and two others
were the first portraits of Mr. Lincoln by Brady, and are known as the Cooper Institute portraits,
having been taken on the day he delivered his famous speech in Cooper Institute under the auspices
of the Young Men's. Central Republican Union of New York City. "While in New York he [Lin-
coln," says Miss Tarbell's "Life of Abraham Lincoln," "was taken by the committee of entertain-
ment to Brady's gallery, and sat for the portrait reproduced above. It was a frequent remark
with Lincoln that this portrait and the Cooper Institute speech made him President"

[graphic]

COOPER INSTITUTE AS IT WAS AT THE TIME OF THE DELIVERY OF PRESIDENT LINCOLN'S FAMOUS ADDRESS
From an architect's drawing of the period. The building has been considerably changed since

the time when this drawing was made, two additional stories having been added; the audi-
torium, however, remains in the basement, as it was when Lincoln delivered his address. The
building was erected by Peter Cooper, in 1853, as "an Institute for the free instruction in
useful and practical science and art"

to them and have sent me money for the trip. I can manage the rest of the way."

My father was one of the vicepresidents of the meeting, and he arranged to secure a seat for me on the platform. Lincoln had never been in the East, and his personality was unfamiliar to an Eastern audience. It was understood that the lawyer from Illinois was going to talk in New York about the fight against slavery. It was probable that a large part of the audience expected something "wild and woolly." The more optimistic of the hearers were hoping, however, that perhaps a new Henry Clay had arisen and were looking for utterances of the ornate and grandiloquent kind such as they had heard frequently from Clay and from other statesmen of the South.

The first impression of the man from the West did nothing to contradict the expectation of something weird, rough, and uncultivated. The long, ungainly figure, upon which hung clothes that, while new for the trip, were evidently the work of an unskillful tailor; the large feet; the clumsy hands, of which, at the outset at least, the orator seemed to be unduly conscious; the long, gaunt head capped by a shock of hair that seemed not to have been thoroughly brushed out, made a picture which did not fit in with New York's conception of a finished statesman. The first utterance of the voice was not pleasant to the ear, the tone being harsh and the key too high. As the speech progressed, however, the speaker seemed to get into

control of himself. He caught the tone of the hall (he had never before spoken in a large hall), the voice gained a natural and impressive modulation, the gestures were dignified and appropriate, and the hearers came under the influence of the earnest look from the deeply set eyes and of the absolute integrity of purpose and of devotion to principle which were behind the thought and the words of the speaker.

It was evident that the man from the West understood thoroughly the Constitutional history of the country; he had mastered the issues that had grown up about the slavery question; he knew thoroughly, and was prepared to respect, the rights of his political opponents; he knew with equal thoroughness the rights of the men whose views he was helping to shape, and he insisted that there should be no wavering or weakening in regard to the enforcement of those rights. He made it clear that the continued existence of the Nation depended upon having these issues equitably adjusted, and he held that the equitable adjustment meant the restriction of slavery within its present boundaries. He maintained that such restrictions were just and necessary for the sake of fairness to the blacks as well as for the final welfare of the whites. He insisted that the voters in the present States in the Union had upon them the largest possible measure of responsibility in so controlling the great domain of the Republic that the States of the future, the States in which their children and their grandchildren were to grow up as

citizens, must be preserved in full liberty, must be protected against any invasion of an institution which represented barbarity. He maintained that such a contention could interfere in no way with the due recognition of the legitimate property rights of the present owners of slaves. He pointed out to the New Englander of the antislavery group that the restriction of slavery meant its early extermination. He insisted that war for the purpose of exterminating slavery from existing slave territory could not be justified. He was prepared, however, for the purpose of defending against slavery the National territory that was still free, to take the risk of the war which the South threatened because he believed that only through such action could the existence of the Nation be maintained; and he believed, further, that the maintenance of the great Republic was essential, not only for the interests of its own citizens, but for the interests of free government throughout the world. Lincoln spoke with full sympathy of the 'difficulties and problems resting upon the South, and he insisted that the matters at issue could be adjusted only with a fair recognition of these difficulties. Aggression from either side of Mason and Dixon's Line must be withstood.

I was but a boy when I first looked upon the gaunt figure of the man who was to become the people's leader and listened to his calm but forcible arguments in behalf of the principles of the Republican party. I have read the address more than once since, and it is of

course impossible to separate my first impressions from my later direct knowledge. I do remember that I was at once impressed with the feeling that here was a political leader whose methods differed from those of any politician to whom I had listened. Lincoln's contentions were based, not upon invective or abuse of "the other fellow," but purely on considerations of justice, on the everlasting principle that what is just, and only what is just, represents the largest and highest interests of the Nation as a whole.

This speech decided the selection of the National leader, not only for the political campaign, but through the coming struggle. If it had not been for the impression made upon New York and the East generally by Lincoln's speech and by the man himself, the vote of New York could not have been secured in the Convention for his nomination.

Robert Lincoln, writing to me in July, 1908, says: "After the address in

February, father came to me at Exeter. The news of his speech had preceded him, and he was obliged to speak eleven times before leaving New England." It was because he had made a personal impression upon the voters, not only of New York, but of Massachusetts, Rhode Island, and Connecticut, that when the New York delegates in the Convention found that there was no prospect of securing the nomination of Seward, and, in accordance with the instructions of Bryant's committee, gave their vote to the man from Illinois, the delegates from New England followed the lead and made the nomination assured.

An edition of the Cooper Union address was put into print in September, 1860, by the Young Men's Republican Union of New York. The publication of this pamphlet shows that as early as September, 1860, the historic importance and permanent value of this speech were fairly realized by the National leaders of the day.

Never was a political leadership more fairly, more nobly, and more reasonably won. When the ballot-boxes were opened on the first Tuesday in November, Lincoln was found to have secured the electoral vote of every Northern State except New Jersey, and in New Jersey four electors out of seven. Breckinridge, the leader of the extreme Southern Democrats, had back of him only the votes of the Southern States outside of the border States, these latter being divided between Bell and Douglas. Douglas and his shallow theory of "squatter sovereignty" had been buried beneath the good sense of the voters of the North.

It is well that Americans should remember the valuable service rendered by William C. Bryant in helping to bring about the selection as the leader. not only of the new party, but of all Americans who fought and worked to save the Republic, the great Captain, Abraham Lincoln.

TH

PRACTICAL AMERICANISM AT ELLIS ISLAND

HE new Commissioner of Immigration at Ellis Island, Robert E. Tod, avoids interviewers. He has no set theories on immigration. His policy is to say little and do much, and that the latter is the case is quite evident to anybody at all familiar with the Ellis Island of the past. Some real changes have already been made on the "Island of Tears," as Ellis Island is generally referred to in the foreign-language press, and this leads one to think that the entire ambitious programme laid out by the Committee on Immigrant Welfare Work will become a reality in the course of time.

It is almost ten years since I first set foot on Ellis Island, and I have seen and watched the changes that crept in with each changing Commissioner.

To me, familiar with the immigrant and his habits, it was always a source of wonder how the "Island" managed to be so clean and decent, but there were some spots that shocked even my unbiased mind-unbiased in that I have always recognized the difficulties of handling immigrants in such rapidly changing multitudes. The Great War naturally affected the conditions very materially, for it created entirely new and unforeseen situations. Meanwhile the complaints recently made by betterclass aliens were probably well founded: Ellis Island is a clearing-ground for peasants, and not for people of culture.

But Commissioner Tod has dared to face these evil spots. He is eradicating them from the Ellis Island routine. A daring undertaking, for Ellis Island is system-inexorable and unfailingand thorny is the path for him who dares attempt to change it.

a

BY NATALIE DE BOGORY

Commissioner Tod comes from Scotland, and he was a commander in the Navy during the war. His close-knit frame bespeaks the forceful man. Efficiency, a much-abused word, is written in his deliberate movements, and the firm line of his mouth shows that reticence which baffled and forced me on a prowling voyage of discovery at Ellis Island.

The system at Ellis Island was an excellent one in the days of long ago, before the Great War came and introduced unforeseen factors into daily life and into systems in general. The routine that had answered all previous needs could not fill the new demands, and it took a man of original observation and pioneer daring to establish radical ameliorations to meet these changing needs. This is what Commissioner Tod has done.

"We had never thought of doing this," was the comment I heard from several of the old-time officials as they pointed out some of the changes; "and isn't it an improvement?"

From high officials to the most modest ones, I caught this spirit of satisfaction and pride in the doings of the new "chief." In pre-war days immigrants were taken from the ships to Ellis Island on barges designed only for the most temporary sojourn. After passing Quarantine, medical examination used to be simple. But the war brought vermin, and medical examination took on serious aspects. The discovery of a few small insects would hold up whole bargeloads of immigrants sometimes for hours, thus exposing them to crowding and inclement weather. This was a new problem. Commissioner Tod solved

it very simply. He converted a large room, formerly used for storage purposes, into reception-rooms, where immigrants are taken directly from the barges and where they can wait in comfort. What especially attracted my attention were the nice water fountains in the middle of each section-truly an improvement.

Another striking change was the establishment of a cafeteria in the big Information Room for relatives and friends of incoming aliens, where they sometimes wait for whole days before they are called to identify the new arrivals. This is a master stroke, for much criticism comes from these already Americanized immigrants, who are equally quick to appreciate comfort and service.

The recently opened baby nursery for teaching immigrant women how to bathe and properly clothe their infants is another innovation. Surely this is the soundest first lesson in true Americanism. The nursery, with its pale-blue and white decorations, is a model of simplicity and practicability, and the teaching is done by the nurse in charge. The Della Robbia baby on the wall undoubtedly conveys no message to the immigrant mother, but I enjoyed it, so there is no harm.

These were some of the more important innovations that I saw; there were many minor improvements that mean little to any but the initiates on Ellis Island. But even this start gives a value to Commissioner Tod's programme of reform that most proposed programmes do not convey to those of us cynics who have seen and know.

A director of information is to be ap

pointed in the near future to take charge of all welfare work. Interpreters are to be numerous and available to immigrants at a time when they are forbidden to communicate with relatives and friends. Few people can realize the importance of this last provision unless they have spent many days at Ellis Island, as I have done.

I remember some of my visits to detention quarters, where men, women, and children wait, sometimes for weeks, until they are released. Coming in as an outsider from the "other" world, I was usually quickly surrounded by anxious people, showering me with questions in a dozen different languages, asking advice. I remember women begging me to help them get more frequent information regarding their children, lying sick at the Ellis Island hospital. They would cry softly, wiping the tears with their head kerchiefs, but still eagerly listening to my words of just plain human sympathy. That was all they needed a little encouragement, a sense that they were not forgotten in that mass of waiting immigrants.

The "system" had worked in the past,

when sickness was not so prevailing, but the war changed that. The fearful conditions at the ports of embarkationmany are the tales I heard from immigrants about them-were the cause of wholesale sickness and destitution at the New York port. Ellis Island became overcrowded. The hospital was full of the sick; information was not given out frequently. Anxious mothers wept; the detention quarters were a well of unending misery. That Commissioner Tod has tackled the problem of that headquarters of suffering will go a long way towards eliminating the title of "Island of Tears."

Another great improvement is the proposed establishment of a bigger detention room for women and children. It is to be located in the so-called "Railroad Room," a beautiful and airy room. The mere mention of this change brings back to my mind a picture of horrormy last visit to the detention room. It was overcrowded. There were few benches and many, many people standing around for lack of seats. Women reclined uncomfortably on piled-up baggage, children simply lay around on the

floor and everywhere those weeping faces. The room was dark. I think it has few windows-I do not rememberbut the impression was that of a murky cellar. And the stench! Bilge water and dirt and neglected children-it followed me to New York and to my home, though I resolutely walked the deck of the ferry to drive it away.

That visit was made at a time when Ellis Island was overcrowded, so it is perhaps an unfair picture. But the mere possibility of such conditions should be sufficient for reform. I anticipate the pleasure of seeing the new detention room. Perhaps it will wipe out the horror of that last visit.

There are also plans for improving living conditions, but I can say nothing about them, as I have no personal knowledge of what has been in the past.

Commissioner Tod states that he has not mastered the immigration situation, he has no panacea to offer for its evils, but apparently he knows that Ellis Island has been the "Island of Tears" and he is determined to change the name. A worthy object and a worthy beginning.

A

HERBERT

WARD: EXPLORER, SCULPTOR. WAR WORKER

BY ELBERT FRANCIS BALDWIN

NY American who ever saw the collection of African trophies and the sculptures by Herbert Ward in that sculptor's studio in Paris or at his country house will welcome them in their new home at the Smithsonian Institution, Washington. They are shown in the palatial new building of the Institution which we call the National Museum. The collection is a fit counterpart to the Roosevelt collection, on the same floor, at the other end of the Museum.

Herbert Ward was the eldest son of a distinguished naturalist, Edwin Ward, and was born in London in 1863. His boyhood showed the characteristics of his later career-adventure and love of nature. When hardly fifteen years old, he left home in an emigrant ship to see some unexplored lands-New Zealand, Australia, Borneo, Africa. He had been three times around the world before he was twenty-one years of age. For a time he had served as common sailor aboard an English merchantman; he had bunked in the forecastle, he had eaten hardtack, and had done work aloft. In Australia he tended cattle for herdsmen in the hills. In Borneo he commanded a military expedition into the interior. Then he entered the service of the Congo Free State. Here he began to gather his marvelous collection of native curios and trophies, and also relics of the stone age. In 1913 at Rolleboise, and again in 1916, when on a flying visit to America, he told me that

HEAD OF AN AFRICAN WOMAN (In the Luxembourg)

he would like to give this collection to the Smithsonian Institution. He saw the need for it there.

Three years after his arrival in the Congo Sir Henry Stanley made a wonderful journey across Africa from east to west. Learning that Stanley needed

men to carry provisions, Ward, on his own initiative, collected some four hundred natives and marched to meet him. He commanded the rear-guard of the Stanley expedition and remained with Sir Henry in the Congo for two years. Ward was the sole survivor of the Stanley expedition, and has told the world about it in his books "Five Years with the Congo Cannibals" and "My Life with Stanley's Rear-Guard."

Herbert Ward always had a love of art. He used to say to me: "My earliest recollections are of drawing and attempts to paint in water-colors. It became natural to me to sketch when on my travels, and, anyway, always to look on the picturesque and beautiful side of things. But only in sculpture could I portray the African nature."

After he came home from the Congo Ward opened a studio in London, but found that his ideas were hampered by the influences then emanating from the Royal Academy. In France, on the contrary, when his first work, the model of the head of a native African, was exhibited, he received a "mention" at once. This encouragement, he told me, resulted in his going to live in France. The bronze head referred to received more than a "mention." It was afterwards bought by the French Government for the Luxembourg, and a girl's head made later by Ward is also in that national gallery.

Ward married a daughter of Charles H. Sanford, of New Jersey, a banker

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