qr ————————————————————
Bellefonte, Pa., November 2, 1928
A ASAT.
NEW YORK CITY.
Big and busy New York City,
Blend of ugly and of pretty,
Blend of splendor and of squalor,
Harbor for the weary sailor,
Gateway for the world’s sad peoples
Flinging to the sky your steeples,
Writing in your daily history
All life's joys and pain and mystery!
Always when I come to visit
I am struck by scenes exquisite,
Here is everything that’s human
Done on earth by man and woman,
Here is grim and stern faced duty,
Driving, striving, blind to beauty,
Here among the millions teeming
Are all things which men are dreaming.
Here they come with strange pale faces
From the far off troubled places,
Dragging with their fresh traditions
Blended with their fresh ambitions,
Here the richest and the gladdest
Shoulder with the worst and saddest,
Here is laughter, here is sighing,
Here each minute seme are dying.
Here the sky line tells the story
Of man’s constant strife for glory;
Here is Broadway with its night life
Gaily picturing our bright life,
With its dull, cold hint of warning
In the early after-morning.
Big and busy New York City
Blend of ugly and of pretty!
—Edgar A. Guest.
THE UNHAPPY STORY OF MARY
TODD, THE WOMAN LINCOLN
(Continued from last week.)
When she learned that Congress, if
pressed, would make an adequate ap-
propriation for renovating the Execu-
tive Mansion, Mary took steps to hur-
ry the appropriation.
But this brought the newspapers
about her ears. They declared that
Mrs. Lincoln was meddling in politics
and one enterprising journalist re-
ported that she constantly forced her
way into the Cabinet room to row
with the members over their policies.
For a while it looked to Mary as
if all the years of fighting for self-
control were to be useless in the face
of this type of torment.
Summer was calling on Mary one
summer evening. Charles Sumner,
Senator from Massachusetts, was one
of the few noble personalities in
Washington. Physically as well as
mentally he was superb. He was six
feet four inches tall, with fine blue
eyes and regular, clean-cut features
of the sober New England type.
Mary and Sumner had met at the
Inaugural Ball. They liked each
other immediately. Sumner was
Mary’s type of man, intellectual and
of the polite werld. In his turn, Sum-
ner was astonished to find in Lin-
coln’s wife a woman of exceptional
intelligence and breadth of education.
Their mutual fondness for French
was an immediate bond and they
made the most of it. By midsummer
they were exchanging French books
and frequently conversed in that
tongue.
On this particular evening Mary
actually had brought a shout of
laughter from the serious-eyed Sum-
ner by her mimicry of Horace Gree-
ley in his favorite act of lecturing
her husband. But she did not allow
him to laugh long, for she added af-
ter the mock Greely had disappeared:
“He had the impertinence to warn
Mr. Lincoln also against my intrigu-
ing with the South! Senator, do you
know they say I am a spy because I
have half-brothers in the Rebel
army ?”
“You too are a victim of slavery,”
replied Sumner sadly. “The ruling
social set here prides itself on being
Southern. Its members, male and_fe-
male, hate this administration vio-
lently. They say you are a renegade
Southerner—one of themselves, gone
over to the other side. I tell you
frankly, dear Mrs. Lincoln, they are
bent on your social ruin.”
Mary swept up and down the room
in her trailing gray and pink velvet,
then paused to shake a small finger
before the enormous Senator’s vest
button.
“Ill fight them inch by inch!” sle
cried.
“You can’t fight malicious gossip,
I've found.” said Sumner. “Ignore
it, Mrs. Lincoln. Give your mind to
vour husband’s great problems.”
“I'll try,” replied Mary, through set
teeth.
~ It was an inevitable aspect of her
bitter fate that the very qualities in
her that helped to make her husband
an immortal hero, fed the malignant
tongues that ruined her fame. Her
indomitable will and ambition would
not allow her for a long time to give
up the social struggle. She planned
the social side of the White House
iife with her usual skill, but she got
nowhere.
believed that she was a coarse par-
venu, without social training, utterly ,
unbalanced by her sudden elevation to :
grandeur. She was called low, coarse,
gaudy, loud and a snob.
threatened with assassination.
boys would be kidnapped as well as
her husband.
She said to Sumner, one evening
early in 1862: “Senator, do you real-
ize that I am one of the most hated
persons in this unhappy country? it
is like a fog pressing about me day | “prized as representing so noble and
1 believe it will kill me, | good a friend to our cause,” and the |
and night.
this hatred.’
“Can you not give up all but the
essential official entertainments, dear
Mrs. Lincoln, an o
“And dress in a bag without a crin-
oline,” interrupted Mary with a sad
little laugh, “and give up your friend-
ship—you’ve heard that gossip?”
“A little. No one dares say very
much to me, I assure you.”
“They call it an affaire d’amour
and write Mr. Lincoln dreadful things,
signed ‘An eye-witness.” If it is hurt-
ing your prestige, dear Mr. Sumner,
I'll understand if you never call on
me again.” © But her eyes were full
of tears.
“I wouldn't understand,” returned
Sumner grimly. “Frienship is an
It was said and generally :
She was |
An-!
onymous letters warned her that her
1
: eternal matter with me. Such pres-
| tige as I have has survived the worst
| that human tongues can say. Let us
forget it.” He paused and stared out
the window at the raw, unfinished
shaft of the Washington Monument.
Then he went on sadly: “When I was
assaulted in the Senate Chamber in
1851, no one thought I would live.
In the weary months of illness that
- followed, my thoughts were much on
'my unfinished fight against slavery,
‘but in the midnight watches my keen,
heart-gnawing regret was that if I
| were called away, I never had enjoy-
‘ed the choicest experience of life, that
no lips responsive to my own had said
‘I love you.” When I recovered it was
| with the determination that as soon
fas I could afford to marry I would.
| Alas, it seems, however, I'm not the
i type women wish to marry. But I
! have friendships with some noble wo-
imen. You are one of them. I intend
not to sacrifice a single friendship for
all the gossip in America.”
Sumner’s fine declaration could but
hearten her and she staggered on
with her social burden. But she did
not go far. Early in 1862 she re-
ceived a blow that for a time com-
. pletely submerged her. Willie died
of typhoid in Februray. After Wil-
: lie’s death, Mary never again went
into the room where the child died.
. For months she never went out.
Sumner now suggested that she
turn her splendid executive ability to
hospital work. The suggestion was
rexactly in tune with her state of
‘mind. Before si‘e had been at the
work a week, the crowded, ill-organ-
ized hospitals in and around Wash-
ington began to feel the impulse of
her helping hand.
Young Stoddard tried to persuade
her to allow the reporters to go with
her on her hospital rounds and pub-
lish the story. He told her it would
help enormously to counteract the
talk against her. But Mary had had
enough of publicity, good or bad, and
the beautiful story of her hospital
service never was told.
Gossip now included Lincoln and
his domestic life. Stories of terrible
quarrels between the Lincolns became
current. Lincoln—who did not drink
—was widely believed to have beaten
his wife while he was drunk, and at
another time to have thrown her bod-
ily out of the Cabinet room—whither
she never came. It was asserted that
Lincoln had forbidden Sumner the
house. :
It is singularly grotesque that
while the gossips were so busy with
lies there was an essential weakness
of character which Mary was showing
which they did not discover that
would have been unspeakably unc-
tuous on their tongues. This was her
love of finery.
When Mary Lincoln became mis-
tress of the White House, every
temptation imaginable was brought to
bear on her love of beauty. As soon
as she reached Washington, the
trades-people of that city and of New
York besieged her to open accounts
with them, offering what seemed like
unlimited credit. Shopkeepers camp-
ed on her doorstep, haunted her foot-
steps urging dress fabrics, furs, jew-
elry and objects d’art upon her con-
sideration. Job-hunters and political
panderers filled the White House with
gifts for Mrs. Lincoln and the little
boys. And Mary lost her head. She
opened accounts in the shops of Wash-
ington and New York.
The President’s salary was ade-
quate for everything but his wife’s
wardrobe. After a couple of years
bills began to bother Mary. She ig-
nored them. Finally one of her New
York creditors threatened to sue her.
She would rather have died than have
her husband learn the extent of her
extravagance. In fact she did not
learn the extent of it herself until
the creditors frightened her. Then
she gathered the bills together, added
them up and took to her bed. The
total was nearly $20,000.
This was in 1864 and Lincoln was
running for a second term of office.
if the story got out! Mary sent for
Lizzie Keckley, who frequently acted
as lady’s maid for her. The colored
woman was a remarkable character,
self-respecting, a good business wo-
man and devoted to the President’s
wife.
When Mary, half hysterical, had
confided her troubles to the mcdiste,
that astute person had a practical
suggestion:
“Tell » your creditors that if your
husband is reelected you will pay
them back on the instalment plan
from his salary. If he’s not re-elect-
ed, he’ll be a great lawyer with enor-
mous fees and you can pay your bills
easily.”
Mary took the advice. Lincoln won
the election and Mary planned to pay
the piper.
In April came the irreparable loss
to Mary and the nation—Lincoln was
assassinated. The shock put Mary to
bed for five weeks. Lizzie Keckley
took care of her. She would see no
one save Bob and Tad. When she
was at last able to creep about, she
began preparations for leaving the
White House.
All of us who have had to do with
death will understand Mary’s state of
mind when she utterly refused to en-
She told Lizzie Keckley to gather Lin-
coln’s clothes together and give them
away. One or two mementoes she
disposed of herself. She could not
| bear to see Charles Sumner although
the called on her several times. But
| she sent him two souvenirs of her
husband, one a likeness of John
, Bright, which Lincoln had said he
| other the President’s cane, with this
note:
Executive Mansion, Tuesday
morning, May 9, 1865.
My dear Mr. Sumner:—Your
unwavering kindness to my idol-
ized husband and the grea: re-
gard he entertained for you,
prompts me to offer for your ac-
ceptance, this simple relic which,
being connected with his blessed
memory, I am sure you will prize.
I am endeavoring to regain my,
strength sufficiently to leave here
in a few days. I go hence, brok-
enhearted, with every hope al-
most in life crushed. Notwith-
standing my utter desolation
through life, the cherished friend
ter her dead husband’s bedroom, when
‘ she could not bear to see his clothing.
of my husband and myself will al-
ways be gratefully remembered.
With kindest regards, I remain
always, yours very truly,
Mary Lincoln.
Combined with her great grief was
the scalding consciousness of her
enormous debts. She was wild with
apprehension lest someone get wind
of them. She had no one in whom,
in her shame and chagrin, she dared
to confide save the faithful ex-slave,
Lizzie Keckley. Lizzie was all sym-
pathy and when Mary stated that the
clothing and jewelry, with the objects
d’art she had accumulated, might as
a last resort be sold to pay the debts,
Lizzie approved and offered her help
in the disposal of them.
With this idea in mind, Mary de-
termined to take back to Chicago with.
her every scrap of personal adorn-
ment belonging to her. Of household
furnishings she took not one stick,
save a little dressing stand used by
the President. He had been very fond
of it and had once told his wife that
if the Commissioner would consent to
their putting another stand in its
place, he'd like to take it back to
Springfield with him. After hig
death, Mary obtained the Commis-
sioner’s consent to the exchange and
the little table was sent to Chicago
for Taddie to use.
The packing, under Lizzie Keck-
ley’s supervision, was a helter-
skelter affair.
monopolies thus far projected.
an enormous number of boxes, fifty
or sixty of them, and every one of
them was used. Mary, obsessed with
her fear of bankruptey, ordered that
every personal article be packed. So
even discarded bonnets she had
brought from Springfield were put
into the boxes. Sometimes, with the
inane extravagance of servants, a
whole box contained but one bonnet.
The presents that she and the chil-
dren had received; elaborate furs,
toys, pictures, books, statuary, wax
wreaths, hunting trophies; all went
into the packing-cases, to be stored in
Chicago until such time as the settle-
ment of her hushand’s estate told her
whether or not they must be sold.
Late in May, 1865, Mary Lincoln,
in a widow’s bonnet, with a great
black gauze veil that fell to the hem
of her enormous black silk skirts, ac-
companied by twelve-year-old Tad in
a black rounabout and black velvet
cap, with Robert, who had just left
Grant’s staff, boarded a Baltimore &
Ohio train for Chicago, and for a lit-
tle while the gossips forgot her.
Her means were very much ham-'
pered. Congress, at the time of Lin-
coln’s death, alloted her $22,000, the
sum remaining of the current year’s
salary. Mary used $3,590 of this to:
clear up domestic bills in Washing-
ton. She made a substantial payment
on her debts and with the residuum
prepared to carry herself and the boys '
until the estate should be settled.
But there was a long delay in the
settlement of Lincoln’s estate.
money dwindled and dwindled and in
the spring of 1867 Lizzie Keckley re-
ceived a letter from Mrs. Lincoln ask-
ing the colored woman to meet her
in New York in September, to help
her dispose of her wardrobe and jew-
elry. She impressed on Lizzie’ the
necessity for absolute secrecy in the:
transaction and wrote that she her-
self was going to take the name of
Mrs. Clarke while she was in New
York.
So, heavily veiled, Mary Todd Lin-
coln late in September, 1867, regis-
tered as Mrs. Clarke at the Union
Place Hotel in New York and waited
for Lizzie to appear. Lizzie arrived
promptly and having with much flut-
tering settled themselves, the two wo-
men sallied forth into Union Square,
bought newspapers and began to seek
a place to sell their wares.
They finally determined to try the
firm of W. H. Brady and Company,
of 609 Broadway. Still veiled, with
Lizzie carrying the jewelry, Mary
presented herself at this place of bus-
iness and asked to see a member of
the firm. She was introduced to a
Mr. Keyej, who undertook to appraise
the jewelry for her. It seemed to
Mary that the scheme was working
splendidly, when Keyes looked up
from the ring he was examining and
said to her abruptly.
“You are Mrs. Lincoln!
is in this ring.”
Startled and troubled, Mary admit-
ted her identity but begged Keyes to
keep her secret. He agreed to do so
and asked her to leave the jewelry
for his partner to examine. He was
sure they could be of real help to this
distinguished patron. Much cheered,
Your name
Mary returned to the hotel and there,
a little later, Mr. Keyes followed her, '
not with a proffer. of money but with
a scheme. He urged Mary to allow
him to use some discreet publicity in
connection with her belongings. He
declared that if she would permit him
to do so, he could raise $100,000 for
her in a few weeks.
Mary refused. She’d been scorch-
ed too often by publicity. Keyes told
her that an ordinary sale of all that
she possessed wouldn’t bring her
$10,000 while a public auction would
net her ten times that amount.
| Deeply distressed, Mary still re--
fused.
; “Then,” urged Keyes, “allow me to
go to some of the leaders of the Re-
publican Party and inform them that
the wife of Lincoln is in dire need.
| They are fattening now on the pres-
.tige your husband gave the party.
They will gladly back a movement
for raising a public fund. Let it be
‘known that the wife of the Great
| Emancipator is trying to raise mon-
"ey by selling her clothes and the
whole country will rally to you.”
He had no idea how sweet his last
words were to his hearer. How sweet
they were, only one who had witnessed
her sufferings in the White House
could know. She flung common sense
away and gave Keyes the permission
he sought.
At his suggestion she wrote sev-
eral letters making W. H. Brady and
Company her agents, harmless and
pathetic letters enough, telling of her
needy condition and stating that her
income when her husband’s estate
should be settled would give her but
$1700 a year. You may be sure she
made no mention of the debts.
With these letters, Keyes went to
several of Lincoln’s old associates,
Seward, Thurlow Weed, Raymond of
the New York Times. These gentle-
The Government sent
Her’
men refused to have anything to do
with the proposal. . . ’
While Keyes was making this pre-
liminary flourish to his next colossal
blunder, Mary, fearing recognition,
went out on Long Island for a few
days. Here she received word from
Keyes that his efforts with Seward
and the others had failed. He re-
counted some of their comments on
her White House career.
The revival of the old lies upset
Mary completely. She flew to her
pen and dashed off a note to Keyes in
which she denounced these several
distinguished men in a biting sentence
or two that carried back of them all
her old years of suffering. Having
supplied Keyes with priceless mater-
ial for completely ruining her, she
left for Chicago. Keyes, still fatu-
ously believing he was starting a
campaign that would raise funds for
Lincoln’s wife, sent all of her letters
to the New York World, with the
announcement that Mrs. Lincoln’s ef-
fects were on view at 607 Broadway.
It was not until her train was cress-
ing Indiana that Mary learned what
had happened to her letters. A man
who had been sitting beside her left
a newspaper in the seat. Mary pick-
ed it up. It was a copy of the Spring-
field (Massachusetts) Republican. She
glanced idly up and down its col-
umns. Then a heavily leaded cap-
tion caught her eyes:
Mrs. Lincoln’s Wardrobe for Sale!
That dreadful woman, Mrs.
Lincoln, who is in the open mar-
ket with her useless finery will
not let people forgether or re-
member her as the widow of a
beloved patriot but insists on
thrusting her repugnant person-
ality before the world to the
great mortification of the nation.
The sheet then went on to quote
from the New York World and sev-
eral neighboring papers.
The World had published all her
letters to William Brady and Com-
vany including an inventory of her
effects, and her furious letter regard-
ing Seward et al.
The Rochester Democrat, the Al-
bany Journal, the Pittsburgh Com-
mercial, the Cleveland Herald—a doz-
en papers were quoted in which Mary
was accused of everything from in-
discretions in a social way to actually
having stolen the articles she was
trying to sell. They said she had
‘ dishonored herself, her country and
"her husband. They said she was in-
{sane and a vertiable Xantippe.
Mary read until the last slurring
word was burned indelibly into her
brain. She was conscious of feeling
faint, but she dared ot ask for aid
lest her identity be disclosed. The
i train pulled into Fort Wayne and the
brakeman bawled that twenty minutes
would be allower for supper. Mary
waited until the car was emptied;
then she dragged herself into the
' station for a cup of tea.
The dining-room was filled with a
gulping crowd. The long table near
the packed counter showed but one
empty place. Into this slipped Mary.
A man at her left offered her bread.
There was a familiar look about the
huge, beautiful hand that held the
plate. She dared not look up as she
murmured her thanks. But she could
not wholly disguise her voice. The
plate was hastily set down and
Charles Sumner stooped to look in-
to her face!
“But you!” he exclaimed.
And alone?”
Mary had not met the Senator since
her husband’s death. The sound of
that familiar voice, the extraordin-
ary and familiar gentleness of the
blue eyes, the whole elegant outline
of “this noblest Roman of them all”
as Lincoln had called him, utterly un-
“Here!
did Mary. She rose with a stammer-
'ed excuse.
“I came out only to get a cup of
tea—for—a friend who is ill,” she
said and fled back to the train.
She cowered in her seat with two
thicknesses of veil over her face. Had
Sumner read the papers? Undoubt-
edly! Her old friend who had helped
her bridge over so many moments of
agony—now surely he would turn
against her at last. “My tongue!
My traitor tongue!” she whispered.
The train started but was scarcely
out of the station when a cup of tea
slopping over into the saucer was
balanced on her knee and Charles
Summer seated himself beside her.
“I suspected who the friend might
be,” he said. “You ate nothing. Let
me see you drink the tea.”
The touch of kindness was too
much. She flung tea, cup and saucer
out of the open window and buried
her face in her hands.
Oblivious to the gaping passengers,
"quite as though they were alone in
the familiar White House sitting
room, Sumner laid his hand on her
rarm and waited for Mary to get con-
I trol of herself. At least she would
‘not make a scene for this last and
dearest of her friends. She threw
| back her veil and smiled up at him.
She had a lovely smile.
| “What are vou doing in the Middle
West, Senator?” she asked.
“I'm on a lecture tour. People are
very kind. Ana you »
But Mary interrupted. “I receiv-
ed the announcement of your mar-
riage last year and wrote you how
glad I was for you, as you may re-
member. But now I can say to you
that it made me happy to know that
the thing you had desired so long had
come into your life.”
Sumner’s leonine head drooped and
the hand that still lay on Mary's
arm trembled. “It was not to be,” he
said in a low voice. “We parted last
month, never to meet again.”
“Dear Senator, are you telling me
your wife has died?” exclaimed Mary.
“No! No! Our marriage is brok-
en. I—I cannot talk about it, even
to you.”
Mary laid her little hand on Sum-
ner’s huge one. “Oh, that is trouble
indeed—after all your years of hope!
I am so, so sorry!”
There was a little pause, then the
Senator said, “And this new contume-
ly that is being heaped upon you?
Where are your friends, your family,
dear Mrs. Lincoln, that you should
be pushed to such extremities?” He
looked down on her with puzzled and
anxious eyes.
She felt her face burn. “I have
debts I cannot tell my family a2bout—
I have been a fool. My tongue, my
abominable tongue! I am sick with
1850 to 1865.
chagrin at myself. But truly I do
“not merit things they are saying.”
“Don’t I know that! The wretched
cads ! One can only bow the head
while the liars empty themselves.
When this furore in the papers has
been forgotten, you must allow me to
apply for a pension for you. You
shall hear from me about it. This
is my station, I fear.”
He rose as he spoke and with a last
pressure of his great hand left the
train, and Mary went on to face Chi-
cago alone.
Tad met her at the station. Ex-
citement always increased the imped-
iment in his spech. He was fourteen
now, tall and with his mother’s win-
ning vivacity of manner. He ran
down the long platform and gathered
her in his arms, stuttering and sob-
bing. At first she could make little
of what he said, but in the carriage
he showed her a rumpled newspaper
clipping. Mary could not more re-
sist reading it than one can resist
gazing at the horrors in a museum.
Someone had given Tad a copy of the
letter Thurlow Weed had written to
the N. Y. Commercial Advertiser.
Mrs. Lincoln treated the Presi-
dent’s friends with studied inso-
lence and indifference. She fal-
sified a bill for entertaining
Prince Napoleon . . . Mrs. Lin-
coln’s propensity to sell things
was manifested early and before
any necessity was foreseen. If
our information is reliable, elev-
en of Mr. Lincoln’s new linen
shirts were sold before the re-
mains which were enshrouded on
the 12th had started for that
bourne from which no traveler
returns. Individually we are
obliged to Mrs. Lincoln for an ex-
pression of her ill will. It is
pleasant to remember that we al-
ways were out of favor in that
quarter . .
Mary finished the clipping and tore
it into a dozen pieces while she min-
gled her tears with Taddie’s. She
gathered that he was going to take
his father’s cane and beat to death
the editor of every paper that had
maligned her. They had reached the
house before she extracted from him
a promise that he’d do nothing to
add to her trouble.
Rob was older and just beginning
his sturdy and spotless career. He
was utterly devastated by this horrible
publicity. It was a pitiful group
there in the little house—not really a
home, for Mary had been obliged to
take roomers—a pitiful group.
Abraham Lincoln's wife and sons,
panic stricken, wondering where they
could hide from the scandal-mongers.
Rob solved it as far as he was con-
cerned by going out to the Rockies on
a hunting trip with his friend Edgar
Welles.
Mary wrote Lizzie Keckley on Sun-
day morning, October 6:
My dear Lizzie: I am writing
this morning with a broken heart
after a sleepless night of great
mental suffering. Rob came up
last evening like a maniac and
almost threatening his life, look-
ing like death because the letters
of the World were published yes-
terday evening. I could not re-
frain from weeping when I saw
him so miserable. But yet, my
dear, good Lizzie, was it not to
protect myself and help others—
and was not my motive and ac-
tion of the purest kind? Pray
for me that this cup of affliction
may pass from me or be sancti-
fied to . . . Only my darling Tad-
die prevents me from taking my
life . . . Tell Messrs. Brady and
Keyes not to have a line of mine
once more in print. I am nearly
losing my reason. Your friend,
M. L.
Chicago, Saturday, October 13.
My dear Lizzie: Was ever such
cruel newspaper abuse lavished
upon an unoffending woman as
has been showered upon my de-
fenseless head? . . . The Spring-
field Journal had an editorial a
few days since with the import-
ant information that Mrs. Lin-
coln had been known to be de-
ranged for years and should be
pitied for all her strange acts.
I should have been all right if I
had allowed them to take posses-
sion of the White House . .. I am
always so anxious to hear from
you. I am feeling so friendless
in the world . . . M. L.
She wrote to Brady and Company,
withdrawing her goods, paid their bill
of $800, and the wretched venture
was ended.
Her means were very much re-
stricted. The executors of her hus-
band’s estate still delayed and for a
little while her relatives held aloof.
Then, as the newspapers continued
to outdo themselves in malignancy,
the family’s indignation toward Mary
was superseded by their indignation
toward the news sheets. Mary's sis-
ter Elizabeth now took a hand. She
won from Mary the story of her
debts. She brought about a settle-
ment of the estate and arrangements
were made to take care of the absurd
and awful bills. And in January, ac-
companied : by Taddie, Mary sailed
for Europe—that Europe she and
Lincoln always had planned to see to-
gether. How it hurt her to go with-
out him!
It was not until Mary Lincoln had
been in Europe a year that Charles
Sumner ventured to bring before the
United States Senate the matter of
her pension. ;
It would have been impossible for
her to have had a better sponsor for
her pension bill. Not only was he
a great idealist, but also he was a su-
perb politician. He had survived the
most intricate, the most trying mo-
ments of the Senate’s history, from
If anyone was fitted
to force that pension bill through, it
was Sumner. But even he did not
"foresee the extent of the fight he was
to precipitate.
The Senate was full of veterans
still racked by the tempests of the
Civil War. Scarcely a member could
speak without a violence that made
ordinary partisanship seem a feeble
gesture, of persons or events of that
soul-shattering period.
The: Senate Chamber, Sumner told
himself on that snowy February
morning, 1869, was more his home
than even the house in Boston from
which he had buried his father, his.
-
mother, his brother and his sisters,
for here in the Senate Chamber he:
had spent the supreme hours of his-
manhood. In that seat yonder,
Brooks, the South Carolinian,
beaten him into insensibility, and
from yonder spot he had made the
unparalleled speech fer the Emanci-
pation Proclamation. And here, it
seemed, he was to pead for common
justice to the wife of the author of
what he felt to be the greatest docu-
ment struck off by the hand of man
since the Christian era began.
in this mood and this attitude of
mind, there was no defeating Sum-
ner. But for many months his op-
ponents did not recognize that fact;
though they had seen the same mood
and attitude raise abolition from a
cult to half a nation’s religion.
On this morning he introduced a
bill asking for a pension of $5000,
with a letter from Mrs. Lincoln to
the Vice-President.
Sir:—I herewith most respect-
fully present to the honorable
Senate of the United States an
application for a pension. I am
a widow of a President of Unit-
ed States whose life yas sacrific-
ed to his country’s service. That
sad calamity has very much im-
paired my health and by the ad-
vice of my physician I have come
over to Germany to try the min-
eral waters and during the win-
ter to go to Italy. But my finan-
cial means do not permit me to
take advantage of the advice giv-
en me nor can I live in a style
becoming to the widow of a Chief
Magistrate of a great nation al-
though I live as economically as
I can. In consideration of the
great services my deeply lament-
ed husband has rendered to the
United States, and of the fearful
loss I have sustained by his ¥n-
timely death, I respectfully sub-
mit to your honorable body this
petition.
Mrs. A. Lincoln, Frankfort,
Germany.
After the bill and letter had been
read there was an uneasy rustle in the
Senate Chamber. Senator Edmunds,
of Vermont, sprang to his feet an®
took a hasty step toward the Presi-
dent’s desk. He was a Republican
and Chairman of the Pensions Com-
mittee.
“May I ask the honorable member
from Massachusetts why he has fix-
ed on the sum of five thousand dol-
lars?” asked Edmunds.
“Certainly,” replied Sumner. “Five
thousand dollars was in my mind be-
cause that was the salary just voted
by the Senate to its members, and
five thousand dollars is the interest.
on the seventy-five thousand dollars
Lincoln would have been paid had he
not been killed. I hope that this bill
may soon be put upon its passage.”
Senator Morrill of Vermont cried:
“I am bitterly opposed to such a pen-
sion. 2
He was interrupted by Senator
Howell of Iowa: “I toe am against
such a sneaking fraud on our pension
system. Lincoln never was really
Commander-in-Chief. He performed
no service in the field.”
“Mrs. Lincoln was not true to her
husband!” shouted Senator Yates of
Nlinois. “She sympathized with the
Rebellion. She is not worthy of our
charity.”
“Tut! Tut!” This in a loud groan
from Senator Cameron of Pennsyl-
vania, the handsome veteran of many
Senate battles.
Sumner spoke clearly: “You are
speaking of the wife of Abraham
Lincoln.”
Senator Tipton of Nebraska rose.
“Mrs. Lincoln’s indecent and spec-
tacular effort to sell her clothes late-
ly brought no gestures of sympathy
from the tender heart of Illinois.
That is proof that Mrs. Lincoln has:
no actual need of financial help. She
has a large income from her late hus-
band’s estate. This she is spending
in Europe instead of in her native
land where it should be spent.”
“This is absurd,” cried Oliver P.
Morton of Indiana. “The nation
spent one million dollars on Lincoln’s
funeral. The Congress has just voted
ten thousand dollars for a monument
to him. | Yet it now grudges a pen-
sion to his widow.’
Something in this strident sneer
stopped the debate and the pension
bill was referred to the Pensions
Committee—exactly where Edmunds,
who hated Mary Lincoln, wished it
to go. It would not come out, he
assured his friends, until he was cer-
tain of its defeat.
His first maneuver was to postpone
making a report on the bill. Day
after day Sumner rose in his place
to make inquiry, but Edmunds had re-
reported on other pensions.
Sumner spoke clearly. “Before the
reports of the Pensions Committee
pass away, I wish to ask my honor-
able friend when there will be a re-
port on the bill for Mrs. Mary Lin-
coln?”
With a smile of the utmost suavity,
Senator Edmunds replied, “We are at
work en the report and will make it
soon.”
Sumner returned the smile. *I
hope that the bill may soon be put
upon its passage.”
“We cannot report until we have
finished an inquiry into the lady's
necessities,” said Edmunds.
Trumbull of Illinois looked up from
a memorandum he was making. “I
like your attitude, Senator. I hope
the bill will be passed unanimously
and graciously.” : !
“It will be passed graciously, if at
all,” returned Edmunds coolly. “I
suggest that we take up the matter
of making May thirty a holiday for
decorating national cemeteries.”
Sumner’s great mellow voice sud-
denly filled the Chamber. Visitors in
the gallery craned forward. “The
object of this kindness, this beneii-
cence on the part of the Congress is
Abraham Lincoln’s wife!”
Edmunds leaped into the aisle. It
would never do to allow Sumner to
launch himself into a real speech! “I
rise to a point of order!”
Someone in the gallery clapped.
The Vice-President pounded on his
desk. Sumner gave Edmunds a smile
that was at the same moment threat-
ening and keen.
“Very well, Sir,” said Sumner,
“then let us have that report without:
unnecessary delay.”
(Continued on page 3, Col. 1.)