North America Volume II Part 7

Salaries and wages 25,484,400 Diet of the soldiers 6,200,000 Clothing for the soldiers 3,600,000 ----------- 35,284,400

I believe that these figures may be trusted, unless it be with reference to that sum of $17,000,000 or 3,400,000, which is presumed to include the salaries of all general-officers with their staffs, and also the extra wages paid to soldiers in certain cases. This is given as an estimate, and may be over or under the mark. The sum named as the cost of clothing would be correct, or nearly so, if the army remained in its present force for five years. If it so remained for only one year the cost would be one-fifth higher. It must of course be remembered that the sum above named includes simply the wages, clothes, and food of the men. It does not comprise the purchase of arms, horses, ammunition, or waggons; the forage of horses; the transport of troops, or any of those incidental expenses of warfare which are always, I presume, heavier than the absolute cost of the men, and which in this war have been probably heavier than in any war ever waged on the face of G.o.d's earth. Nor does it include that terrible item of peculation as to which I will say a word or two before I finish this chapter.

The yearly total payment of the officers and soldiers of the armies is as follows. As regards the officers it must be understood that this includes all the allowances made to them, except as regards those on the staff. The sums named apply only to the infantry and artillery. The pay of the cavalry is about ten per cent. higher.

Lieutenant-General. 1,850 General Scott alone holds that rank in the States' army Major-General 1,150 Brigadier-General 800 *Colonel 530 *Lieutenant-Colonel 475 Major 430 Captain 300 First Lieutenant 265 Second Lieutenant 245 First Sergeant 48 Sergeant 40 Corporal 34 Private 31

*A Colonel and Lieutenant-Colonel are attached to each regiment.

In every grade named the pay is, I believe, higher than that given by us, or, as I imagine, by any other nation. It is, however, probable that the extra allowances paid to some of our higher officers when on duty may give to their positions for a time a higher pecuniary remuneration. It will of course be understood that there is nothing in the American army answering to our colonel of a regiment. With us the officer so designated holds a nominal command of high dignity and emolument as a reward for past services.

I have already spoken of my visits to the camps of the other armies in the field, that of General Halleck, who held his head-quarters at St. Louis, in Missouri, and that of General Buell, who was at Louisville, in Kentucky. There was also a fourth army under General Hunter, in Kansas, but I did not make my way as far west as that.

I do not pretend to any military knowledge, and should be foolish to attempt military criticism; but as far as I could judge by appearance, I should say that the men in Buell's army were, of the three, in the best order. They seemed to me to be cleaner than the others, and, as far as I could learn, were in better health. Want of discipline and dirt have, no doubt, been the great faults of the regiments generally, and the latter drawback may probably be included in the former. These men have not been accustomed to act under the orders of superiors, and when they entered on the service hardly recognized the fact that they would have to do so in ought else than in their actual drill and fighting. It is impossible to conceive any cla.s.s of men to whom the necessary discipline of a soldier would come with more difficulty than to an American citizen. The whole training of his life has been against it. He has never known respect for a master, or reverence for men of a higher rank than himself. He has probably been made to work hard for his wages,--harder than an Englishman works,--but he has been his employer's equal. The language between them has been the language of equals, and their arrangement as to labour and wages has been a contract between equals. If he did not work he would not get his money,--and perhaps not if he did.

Under these circ.u.mstances he has made his fight with the world; but those circ.u.mstances have never taught him that special deference to a superior, which is the first essential of a soldier's duty. But probably in no respect would that difficulty be so severely felt as in all matters appertaining to personal habits. Here at any rate the man would expect to be still his own master, acting for himself and independent of all outer control. Our English Hodge, when taken from the plough to the camp, would, probably, submit without a murmur to soap and water and a barber's shears; he would have received none of that education which would prompt him to rebel against such ordinances; but the American citizen, who for a while expects to shake hands with his captain whenever he sees him, and is astonished when he learns that he must not offer him drinks, cannot at once be brought to understand that he is to be treated like a child in the nursery;--that he must change his s.h.i.+rt so often, wash himself at such and such intervals, and go through a certain process of cleansing his outward garments daily. I met while travelling a sergeant of an old regular American regiment, and he spoke of the want of discipline among the volunteers as hopeless. But even he instanced it chiefly by their want of cleanliness. "They wear their s.h.i.+rts till they drop off their backs," said he; "and what can you expect from such men as that?" I liked that sergeant for his zeal and intelligence, and also for his courtesy when he found that I was an Englishman; for previous to his so finding he had begun to abuse the English roundly,--but I did not quite agree with him about the volunteers. It is very bad that soldiers should be dirty, bad also that they should treat their captains with familiarity and desire to exchange drinks with the majors. But even discipline is not everything; and discipline will come at last even to the American soldiers, distasteful as it may be, when the necessity for it is made apparent. But these volunteers have great military virtues. They are intelligent, zealous in their cause, handy with arms, willing enough to work at all military duties, and personally brave. On the other hand they are sickly, and there has been a considerable amount of drunkenness among them. No man who has looked to the subject can, I think, doubt that a native American has a lower physical development than an Irishman, a German, or an Englishman. They become old sooner, and die at an earlier age. As to that matter of drink, I do not think that much need be said against them. English soldiers get drunk when they have the means of doing so, and American soldiers would not get drunk if the means were taken away from them. A little drunkenness goes a long way in a camp, and ten drunkards will give a bad name to a company of a hundred. Let any man travel with twenty men of whom four are tipsy, and on leaving them he will tell you that every man of them was a drunkard.

I have said that these men are brave, and I have no doubt that they are so. How should it be otherwise with men of such a race? But it must be remembered that there are two kinds of courage, one of which is very common and the other very uncommon. Of the latter description of courage it cannot be expected that much should be found among the privates of any army, and perhaps not very many examples among the officers. It is a courage self-sustained, based on a knowledge of the right and on a life-long calculation that any results coming from adherence to the right will be preferable to any that can be produced by a departure from it. This is the courage which will enable a man to stand his ground in battle or elsewhere, though broken worlds should fall around him. The other courage, which is mainly an affair of the heart or blood and not of the brain, always requires some outward support. The man who finds himself prominent in danger bears himself gallantly, because the eyes of many will see him; whether as an old man he leads an army, or as a young man goes on a forlorn hope, or as a private carries his officer on his back out of the fire, he is sustained by the love of praise. And the men who are not individually prominent in danger, who stand their ground shoulder to shoulder, bear themselves gallantly also, each trusting in the combined strength of his comrades. When such combined strength has been acquired, that useful courage is engendered which we may rather call confidence, and which of all courage is the most serviceable in the army. At the battle of Bull's Run the army of the North became panic-stricken and fled. From this fact many have been led to believe that the American soldiers would not fight well, and that they could not be brought to stand their ground under fire. This I think has been an unfair conclusion. In the first place the history of the battle of Bull's Run has yet to be written; as yet the history of the flight only has been given to us. As far as I can learn, the northern soldiers did at first fight well;--so well, that the army of the South believed itself to be beaten. But a panic was created--at first, as it seems, among the teamsters and waggons. A cry was raised, and a rush was made by hundreds of drivers with their carts and horses; and then men who had never seen war before, who had not yet had three months' drilling as soldiers, to whom the turmoil of that day must have seemed as though h.e.l.l were opening upon them, joined themselves to the general clamour, and fled to Was.h.i.+ngton, believing that all was lost. But at the same time the regiments of the enemy were going through the same farce in the other direction!

It was a battle between troops who knew nothing of battles; of soldiers who were not yet soldiers. That individual high-minded courage, which would have given to each individual recruit the self-sustained power against a panic, which is to be looked for in a general, was not to be looked for in them. Of the other courage of which I have spoken, there was as much as the circ.u.mstances of the battle would allow.

On subsequent occasions the men have fought well. We should, I think, admit that they have fought very well when we consider how short has been their practice at such work. At Somerset, at Fort Henry, at Fort Donnelson, at Corinth, the men behaved with courage, standing well to their arms, though at each place the slaughter among them was great. They have always gone well into fire, and have generally borne themselves well under fire. I am convinced that we in England can make no greater mistake than to suppose that the Americans as soldiers are deficient in courage.

But now I must come to a matter in which a terrible deficiency has been shown, not by the soldiers, but by those whose duty it has been to provide for the soldiers. It is impossible to speak of the army of the North and to leave untouched that hideous subject of army contracts. And I think myself the more specially bound to allude to it because I feel that the iniquities which have prevailed, prove with terrible earnestness the demoralizing power of that dishonesty among men in high places, which is the one great evil of the American States. It is there that the deficiency exists, which must be supplied before the public men of the nation can take a high rank among other public men. There is the gangrene, which must be cut out before the government, as a government, can be great. To make money is the one thing needful, and men have been anxious to meddle with the affairs of government, because there might money be made with the greatest ease. "Make money," the Roman satirist said; "make it honestly if you can, but at any rate make money." That first counsel would be considered futile and altogether vain by those who have lately dealt with the public wants of the American States.

This is bad in a most fatal degree, not mainly because men in high places have been dishonest, or because the government has been badly served by its own paid officers. That men in high places should be dishonest, and that the people should be cheated by their rulers is very bad. But there is worse than this. The thing becomes so common, and so notorious, that the American world at large is taught to believe that dishonesty is in itself good. "It behoves a man to be smart, sir!" Till the opposite doctrine to that be learned; till men in America,--ay, and in Europe, Asia, and Africa,--can learn that it specially behoves a man not to be smart, they will have learned little of their duty towards G.o.d, and nothing of their duty towards their neighbour.

In the instances of fraud against the States' government to which I am about to allude, I shall take all my facts from the report made to the House of Representatives at Was.h.i.+ngton by a Committee of that House in December, 1861. "Mr. Washbourne, from the Select Committee to inquire into the Contracts of the Government, made the following Report." That is the heading of the pamphlet. The Committee was known as the Van Wyck Committee, a gentleman of that name having acted as chairman.

The Committee first went to New York, and began their inquiries with reference to the purchase of a steam-boat called the "Catiline."

In this case a certain Captain Comstock had been designated from Was.h.i.+ngton as the agent to be trusted in the charter or purchase of the vessel. He agreed on behalf of the Government to hire that special boat for 2000 a month for three months, having given information to friends of his on the matter, which enabled them to purchase it out-and-out for less than 4000. These friends were not connected with s.h.i.+pping matters, but were lawyers and hotel proprietors. The Committee conclude "that the vessel was chartered to the Government at an unconscionable price; and that Captain Comstock, by whom this was effected, while enjoying _the peculiar confidence of the Government_, was acting for and in concert with the parties who chartered the vessel, and was in fact their agent." But the report does not explain why Captain Comstock was selected for this work by authority from Was.h.i.+ngton, nor does it recommend that he be punished.

It does not appear that Captain Comstock had ever been in the regular service of the Government, but that he had been master of a steamer.

In the next place one Starbuck is employed to buy s.h.i.+ps. As a government agent he buys two for 1300, and sells them to the government for 2900. The vessels themselves, when delivered at the Navy Yard, were found to be totally unfit for the service for which they had been purchased. But why was Starbuck employed, when, as appears over and over again in the report, New York was full of paid government servants ready and fit to do the work? Starbuck was merely an agent, and who will believe that he was allowed to pocket the whole difference of 1600? The greater part of the plunder was, however, in this case refunded.

Then we come to the case of Mr. George D. Morgan, brother-in-law of Mr. Welles, the Secretary of the Navy. I have spoken of this gentleman before, and of his singular prosperity. He ama.s.sed a large fortune in five months, as a government agent for the purchase of vessels, he having been a wholesale grocer by trade. This gentleman had had no experience whatsoever with reference to s.h.i.+ps. It is shown by the evidence that he had none of the requisite knowledge, and that there were special servants of the government in New York at that time, sent there specially for such services as these, who were in every way trustworthy, and who had the requisite knowledge. Yet Mr. Morgan was placed in this position by his brother-in-law the Secretary of the Navy, and in that capacity made about 20,000 in five months, all of which was paid by the government, as is well shown to have been the fact in the report before me. One result of such a mode of agency is given;--one other result, I mean, besides the 20,000 put into the pocket of the brother of the Secretary of the Navy. A s.h.i.+p called the "Stars and Stripes" was bought by Mr.

Morgan for 11,000, which had been built some months before for 7000. This vessel was bought from a company which was blessed with a President. The President made the bargain with the government agent, but insisted on keeping back from his own company 2000 out of the 11,000 for expenses incident to the purchase. The company did not like being mulcted of its prey, and growled heavily; but their President declared that such bargains were not got at Was.h.i.+ngton for nothing. Members of Congress had to be paid to a.s.sist in such things. At least he could not reduce his little private bill for such a.s.sistance below 1600. He had, he said, positively paid out so much to those venal Members of Congress, and had made nothing for himself to compensate him for his own exertions. When this President came to be examined, he admitted that he had really made no payments to Members of Congress. His own capacity had been so great that no such a.s.sistance had been found necessary. But he justified his charge on the ground that the sum taken by him was no more than the company might have expected him to lay out on Members of Congress, or on ex-Members who are specially mentioned, had he not himself carried on the business with such consummate discretion! It seems to me that the Members or ex-Members of Congress were shamefully robbed in this matter.

The report deals manfully with Mr. Morgan, showing that for five months' work,--which work he did not do and did not know how to do,--he received as large a sum as the President's salary for the whole Presidential term of four years. So much better is it to be an agent of government than simply an officer! And the Committee adds, that they "do not find in this transaction the less to censure in the fact that this arrangement between the Secretary of the Navy and Mr.

Morgan was one between brothers-in-law." After that who will believe that Mr. Morgan had the whole of that 20,000 for himself? And yet Mr. Welles still remains Secretary of the Navy, and has justified the whole transaction in an explanation admitting everything, and which is considered by his friends to be an able State paper. "It behoves a man to be smart, sir." Mr. Morgan and Secretary Welles will no doubt be considered by their own party to have done their duty well as high trading public functionaries. The faults of Mr. Morgan and of Secretary Welles are nothing to us in England; but the light in which such faults may be regarded by the American people is much to us.

I will now go on to the case of a Mr. c.u.mmings. Mr. c.u.mmings, it appears, had been for many years the editor of a newspaper in Philadelphia, and had been an intimate political friend and ally of Mr. Cameron. Now at the time of which I am writing, April, 1861, Mr.

Cameron was Secretary-at-War, and could be very useful to an old political ally living in his own State. The upshot of the present case will teach us to think well of Mr. Cameron's grat.i.tude.

In April, 1861, stores were wanted for the army at Was.h.i.+ngton, and Mr. Cameron gave an order to his old friend c.u.mmings to expend 2,000,000 dollars, pretty much according to his fancy, in buying stores. Governor Morgan, the Governor of New York State and a relative of our other friend Morgan, was joined with Mr. c.u.mmings in this commission, Mr. Cameron no doubt having felt himself bound to give the friends of his colleague at the Navy a chance. Governor Morgan at once made over his right to his relative; but better things soon came in Mr. Morgan's way, and he relinquished his share in this partners.h.i.+p at an early date. In this transaction he did not himself handle above 25,000 dollars. Then the whole job fell into the hands of Mr. Cameron's old political friend.

The 2,000,000 of dollars, or 400,000, were paid into the hands of certain government treasurers at New York, but they had orders to honour the draft of the political friend of the Secretary-at-War, and consequently 50,000 was immediately withdrawn by Mr. c.u.mmings, and with this he went to work. It is shown that he knew nothing of the business; that he employed a clerk from Albany whom he did not know, and confided to this clerk the duty of buying such stores as were bought; that this clerk was recommended to him by Mr. Weed, the editor of a newspaper at Albany, who is known in the States as the special political friend of Mr. Seward, the Secretary of State; and that in this way he spent 32,000. He bought linen pantaloons and straw hats to the amount of 4200, because he thought the soldiers looked hot in the warm weather; but he afterwards learned that they were of no use. He bought groceries of a hardware dealer named Davidson, at Albany, that town whence came Mr. Weed's clerk. He did not know what was Davidson's trade, nor did he know exactly what he was going to buy; but Davidson proposed to sell him something which Mr. c.u.mmings believed to be some kind of provisions, and he bought it. He did not know for how much,--whether over 2000 or not. He never saw the articles and had no knowledge of their quality. It was out of the question that he should have such knowledge, as he navely remarks. His clerk Humphreys saw the articles. He presumed they were brought from Albany, but did not know. He afterwards bought a s.h.i.+p,--or two or three s.h.i.+ps. He inspected one s.h.i.+p "by a mere casual visit:" that is to say, he did not examine her boilers; he did not know her tonnage, but he took the word of the seller for everything.

He could not state the terms of the charter, or give the substance of it. He had had no former experience in buying or chartering s.h.i.+ps. He also bought 75,000 pair of shoes at only 25 cents, or one s.h.i.+lling a pair, more than their proper price. He bought them of a Mr. Hall, who declares that he paid Mr. c.u.mmings nothing for the job, but regarded it as a return for certain previous favours conferred by him on Mr.

c.u.mmings in the occasional loans of 100 or 200.

At the end of the examination it appears that Mr. c.u.mmings still held in his hand a slight balance of 28,000, of which he had forgotten to make mention in the body of his own evidence. "This item seems to have been overlooked by him in his testimony," says the report. And when the report was made nothing had yet been learned of the destiny of this small balance.

Then the report gives a list of the army supplies miscellaneously purchased by Mr. c.u.mmings:--280 dozen pints of ale at 9_s._ 6_d._ a dozen; a lot of codfish and herrings; 200 boxes of cheeses and a large a.s.sortment of b.u.t.ter; some tongues; straw hats and linen "pants;" 23 barrels of pickles; 25 casks of Scotch ale, price not stated; a lot of London porter, price not stated; and some Hall carbines of which I must say a word more further on. It should be remembered that no requisition had come from the army for any of the articles named; that the purchase of herrings and straw hats was dictated solely by the discretion of c.u.mmings and his man Humphreys,--or, as is more probable, by the fact that some other person had such articles by him for sale; and that the government had its own established officers for the supply of things properly ordered by military requisition. These very same articles also were apparently procured, in the first place, as a private speculation, and were made over to the government on the failure of that speculation. "Some of the above articles," says the report, "were s.h.i.+pped by the 'Catiline,' which were probably loaded on private account, and not being able to obtain a clearance was in some way, through Mr. c.u.mmings, transferred over to the government,--_Scotch ale, London porter, selected herrings_, and all." The italics as well as the words are taken from the report.

This was the confidential political friend of the Secretary-at-War, by whom he was intrusted with 400,000 of public money! 28,000 had not been accounted for when the report was made, and the army supplies were bought after the fas.h.i.+on above named. That Secretary-at-War, Mr. Cameron, has since left the Cabinet; but he has not been turned out in disgrace; he has been nominated as minister to Russia, and the world has been told that there was some difference of opinion between him and his colleagues respecting slavery! Mr.

Cameron in some speech or paper declared on his leaving the Cabinet that he had not intended to remain long as Secretary-at-War. This a.s.sertion, I should think, must have been true.

And now about the Hall carbines, as to which the gentlemen on this Committee tell their tale with an evident delight in the richness of its incidents which at once puts all their readers in accord with them. There were altogether some five thousand of these, all of which the government sold to a Mr. Eastman in June, 1861, for 14_s._ each, as perfectly useless, and afterwards bought in August for 4 8_s._ each, about 4_s._ a carbine having been expended in their repair in the mean time. But as regards 790 of these now famous weapons, it must be explained they had been sold by the government as perfectly useless, and at a nominal price, previously to this second sale made by the government to Mr. Eastman. They had been so sold, and then, in April, 1861, they had been bought again for the government by the indefatigable c.u.mmings for 3 each. Then they were again sold as useless for 14_s._ each to Eastman, and instantly rebought on behalf of the government for 4 8_s._ each! Useless for war purposes they may have been, but as articles of commerce it must be confessed that they were very serviceable.

This last purchase was made by a man named Stevens on behalf of General Fremont, who at that time commanded the army of the United States in Missouri. Stevens had been employed by General Fremont as an agent on the behalf of government, as is shown with clearness in the report, and on hearing of these muskets telegraphed to the General at once. "I have 5000 Hall's rifled cast-steel muskets, breech-loading, new, at 22 dollars." General Fremont telegraphed back instantly, "I will take the whole 5000 carbines ... I will pay all extra charges . . ." And so the purchase was made. The muskets, it seems, were not absolutely useless even as weapons of war.

"Considering the emergency of the times," a competent witness considered them to be worth "10 or 12 dollars." The government had been as much cheated in selling them as it had in buying them. But the nature of the latter transaction is shown by the facts that Stevens was employed, though irresponsibly employed, as a government agent by General Fremont; that he bought the muskets in that character himself, making on the transaction 1 18_s._ on each musket; and that the same man afterwards appeared as an aide-de-camp on General Fremont's staff. General Fremont had no authority himself to make such a purchase, and when the money was paid for the first instalment of the arms, it was so paid by the special order of General Fremont himself out of moneys intended to be applied to other purposes. The money was actually paid to a gentleman known at Fremont's head-quarters as his special friend, and was then paid in that irregular way because this friend desired that that special bill should receive immediate payment. After that who can believe that Stevens was himself allowed to pocket the whole amount of the plunder?

There is a nice little story of a clergyman in New York who sold for 40 and certain further contingencies, the right to furnish 200 cavalry horses; but I should make this too long if I told all the nice little stories. As the frauds at St. Louis were, if not in fact the most monstrous, at any rate the most monstrous which have as yet been brought to the light, I cannot finish this account without explaining something of what was going on at that western Paradise in those halcyon days of General Fremont.

General Fremont, soon after reaching St. Louis, undertook to build ten forts for the protection of that city. These forts have since been p.r.o.nounced as useless, and the whole measure has been treated with derision by officers of his own army. But the judgment displayed in the matter is a military question with which I do not presume to meddle. Even if a general be wrong in such a matter, his character as a man is not disgraced by such error. But the manner of building them was the affair with which Mr. Van Wyck's committee had to deal. It seems that five of the forts, the five largest, were made under the orders of a certain Major Kappner at a cost of 12,000, and that the other five could have been built at least for the same sum. Major Kappner seems to have been a good and honest public servant, and therefore quite unfit for the superintendence of such work at St.

Louis. The other five smaller forts were also in progress, the works on them having been continued from 1st September to 25th September, 1861; but on the 25th September General Fremont himself gave special orders that a contract should be made with a man named Beard, a Californian, who had followed him from California to St. Louis. This contract is dated the 25th of September. But nevertheless the work specified in that contract was done previous to that date, and most of the money paid was paid previous to that date. The contract did not specify any lump sum, but agreed that the work should be paid for by the yard and by the square foot. No less a sum was paid to Beard for this work--the cormorant Beard, as the report calls him--than 24,200, the last payment only, amounting to 4000, having been made subsequent to the date of the contract. 20,200 was paid to Beard before the date of the contract! The amounts were paid at five times, and the last four payments were made on the personal order of General Fremont. This Beard was under no bond, and none of the officers of the government knew anything of the terms under which he was working.

On the 14th of October General Fremont was ordered to discontinue these works, and to abstain from making any further payments on their account. But, disobeying this order, he directed his Quartermaster to pay a further sum of 4000 to Beard out of the first sums he should receive from Was.h.i.+ngton, he then being out of money. This however was not paid. "It must be understood," says the report, "that every dollar ordered to be paid by General Fremont on account of these works was diverted from a fund specially appropriated for another purpose." And then again, "The money appropriated by Congress to subsist and clothe and transport our armies was then, in utter contempt of all law and of the army regulations, as well as in defiance of superior authority, ordered to be diverted from its lawful purpose and turned over to the cormorant Beard. While he had received 170,000 dollars (24,200) from the Government, it will be seen from the testimony of Major Kappner that there had only been paid to the honest German labourers, who did the work on the first five forts built under his directions, the sum of 15,500 dollars (3100), leaving from 40,000 to 50,000 dollars (8000 to 10,000) still due; and while these labourers, whose families were clamouring for bread, were besieging the Quartermaster's department for their pay, this infamous contractor Beard is found following up the army and in the confidence of the Major-General, who gives him orders for large purchases, which could only have been legally made through the Quartermaster's department." After that who will believe that all the money went into Beard's pocket? Why should General Fremont have committed every conceivable breach of order against his government, merely with the view of favouring such a man as Beard?

The collusion of the Quartermaster M'Instry with fraudulent knaves in the purchase of horses is then proved. M'Instry was at this time Fremont's Quartermaster at St. Louis. I cannot go through all these.

A man of the name of Jim Neil comes out in beautiful pre-eminence. No dealer in horses could get to the Quartermaster except through Jim Neil, or some such go-between. The Quartermaster contracted with Neil and Neil with the owners of horses; Neil at the time being also military inspector of horses for the Quartermaster. He bought horses as cavalry horses for 24 or less, and pa.s.sed them himself as artillery horses for 30. In other cases the military inspectors were paid by the sellers to pa.s.s horses. All this was done under Quartermaster M'Instry, who would himself deal with none but such as Neil. In one instance, one Elleard got a contract from M'Instry, the profit of which was 8000. But there was a man named Brady. Now Brady was a friend of M'Instry's, who, scenting the carrion afar off, had come from Detroit, in Michigan, to St. Louis. M'Instry himself had also come from Detroit. In this case Elleard was simply directed by M'Instry to share his profits with Brady, and consequently paid to Brady 4000, although Brady gave to the business neither capital nor labour. He simply took the 4000 as the Quartermaster's friend. This Elleard, it seems, also gave a carriage and horses to Mrs. Fremont.

Indeed Elleard seems to have been a civil and generous fellow. Then there is a man named Thompson, whose case is very amusing. Of him the Committee thus speaks:--"It must be said that Thompson was not forgetful of the obligations of grat.i.tude, for, after he got through with the contract, he presented the son of Major M'Instry with a riding pony. That was the only mark of respect," to use his own words, "that he showed to the family of Major M'Instry."

General Fremont himself desired that a contract should be made with one Augustus Sacchi for a thousand Canadian horses. It turned out that Sacchi was "n.o.body: a man of straw living in a garret in New York whom n.o.body knew, a man who was brought out there"--to St.

Louis--"as a good person through whom to work." "It will hardly be believed," says the report, "that the name of this same man Sacchi appears in the newspapers as being on the staff of General Fremont, at Springfield, with the rank of captain."

I do not know that any good would result from my pursuing further the details of this wonderful report. The remaining portion of it refers solely to the command held by General Fremont in Missouri, and adds proof upon proof of the gross robberies inflicted upon the government of the States by the very persons set in high authority to protect the government. We learn how all utensils for the camp, kettles, blankets, shoes, mess-pans, &c., were supplied by one firm, without a contract, at an enormous price, and of a quality so bad as to be almost useless, because the Quartermaster was under obligations to the partners. We learn that one partner in that firm gave 40 towards a service of plate for the Quartermaster, and 60 towards a carriage for Mrs. Fremont. We learn how futile were the efforts of any honest tradesman to supply good shoes to soldiers who were shoeless, and the history of one special pair of shoes which was thrust under the nose of the Quartermaster is very amusing. We learn that a certain paymaster properly refused to settle an account for matters with which he had no concern, and that General Fremont at once sent down soldiers to arrest him unless he made the illegal payment. In October 1000 was expended in ice, all which ice was wasted. Regiments were sent hither and thither with no military purpose, merely because certain officers, calling themselves generals, desired to make up brigades for themselves. Indeed every description of fraud was perpetrated, and this was done not through the negligence of those in high command, but by their connivance and often with their express authority.

It will be said that the conduct of General Fremont during the days of his command in Missouri is not a matter of much moment to us in England; that it has been properly handled by the Committee of Representatives appointed by the American Congress to inquire into the matter; and that after the publication of such a report by them, it is ungenerous in a writer from another nation to speak upon the subject. This would be so if the inquiries made by that Committee and their report had resulted in any general condemnation of the men whose misdeeds and peculations have been exposed. This, however, is by no means the case. Those who were heretofore opposed to General Fremont on political principles are opposed to him still; but those who heretofore supported him are ready to support him again.* He has not been placed beyond the pale of public favour by the record which has been made of his public misdeeds. He is decried by the democrats because he is a republican, and by the anti-abolitionists because he is an abolitionist; but he is not decried because he has shown himself to be dishonest in the service of his government. He was dismissed from his command in the West, but men on his side of the question declare that he was so dismissed because his political opponents had prevailed. Now, at the moment that I am writing this, men are saying that the President must give him another command.

He is still a major-general in the army of the States, and is as probable a candidate as any other that I could name for the next Presidency.

*Since this was written General Fremont has been restored to high military command, and now holds equal rank and equal authority with Maclellan and Halleck. In fact, the charges made against him by the Committee of the House of Representatives have not been allowed to stand in his way. He is politically popular with a large section of the nation, and therefore it has been thought well to promote him to high place. Whether he be fit for such place, either as regards capability or integrity, seems to be considered of no moment.

The same argument must be used with reference to the other gentlemen named. Mr. Welles is still a Cabinet Minister and Secretary for the Navy. It has been found impossible to keep Mr. Cameron in the Cabinet, but he was named as the Minister of the States government to Russia after the publication of the Van Wyck report, when the result of his old political friends.h.i.+p with Mr. Alexander c.u.mmings was well known to the President who appointed him and to the Senate who sanctioned his appointment. The individual corruption of any one man--of any ten men--is not much. It should not be insisted on loudly by any foreigner in making up a balance-sheet of the virtues and vices of the good and bad qualities of any nation. But the light in which such corruption is viewed by the people whom it most nearly concerns is very much. I am far from saying that democracy has failed in America. Democracy there has done great things for a numerous people, and will yet, as I think, be successful. But that doctrine as to the necessity of smartness must be eschewed before a verdict in favour of American democracy can be p.r.o.nounced. "It behoves a man to be smart, sir." In those words are contained the curse under which the States' government has been suffering for the last thirty years.

Let us hope that the people will find a mode of ridding themselves of that curse. I, for one, believe that they will do so.

CHAPTER VIII.

BACK TO BOSTON.

From Louisville we returned to Cincinnati, in making which journey we were taken to a place called Seymour in Indiana, at which spot we were to "make connection" with the train running on the Mississippi and Ohio line from St. Louis to Cincinnati. We did make the connection, but were called upon to remain four hours at Seymour in consequence of some accident on the line. In the same way, when going eastwards from Cincinnati to Baltimore a few days later, I was detained another four hours at a place called Crossline, in Ohio. On both occasions I spent my time in realizing, as far as that might be possible, the sort of life which men lead who settle themselves at such localities. Both these towns,--for they call themselves towns,--had been created by the railways. Indeed this has been the case with almost every place at which a few hundred inhabitants have been drawn together in the western States. With the exception of such cities as Chicago, St. Louis, and Cincinnati, settlers can hardly be said to have chosen their own localities. These have been chosen for them by the originators of the different lines of railway. And there is nothing in Europe in any way like to these western railway settlements. In the first place the line of the rails runs through the main street of the town, and forms not unfrequently the only road. At Seymour I could find no way of getting away from the rails unless I went into the fields. At Crossline, which is a larger place, I did find a street in which there was no railroad, but it was deserted, and manifestly out of favour with the inhabitants. As there were railway junctions at both these posts, there were of course cross-streets, and the houses extended themselves from the centre thus made along the lines, houses being added to houses at short intervals as new comers settled themselves down. The panting and groaning, and whistling of engines is continual; for at such places freight trains are always kept waiting for pa.s.senger trains, and the slower freight trains for those which are called fast. This is the life of the town; and indeed as the whole place is dependent on the railway, so is the railway held in favour and beloved. The noise of the engines is not disliked, nor are its puffings and groanings held to be unmusical. With us a locomotive steam-engine is still, as it were, a beast of prey, against which one has to be on one's guard,--in respect to which one specially warns the children. But there, in the western States, it has been taken to the bosoms of them all as a domestic animal; no one fears it, and the little children run about almost among its wheels. It is petted and made much of on all sides,--and, as far as I know, it seldom bites or tears. I have not heard of children being destroyed wholesale in the streets, or of drunken men becoming frequent sacrifices. But had I been consulted beforehand as to the natural effects of such an arrangement, I should have said that no child could have been reared in such a town, and that any continuance of population under such circ.u.mstances must have been impracticable.

Such places, however, do thrive and prosper with a prosperity especially their own, and the boys and girls increase and multiply in spite of all dangers. With us in England, it is difficult to realize the importance which is attached to a railway in the States, and the results which a railway creates. We have roads everywhere, and our country had been cultivated throughout, with more or less care, before our system of railways had been commenced; but in America, especially in the North, the railways have been the precursors of cultivation. They have been carried hither and thither, through primeval forests and over prairies, with small hope of other traffic than that which they themselves would make by their own influences.

The people settling on their edges have had the very best of all roads at their service; but they have had no other roads. The face of the country between one settlement and another is still in many cases utterly unknown; but there is the connecting road by which produce is carried away, and new comers are brought in. The town that is distant a hundred miles by the rail is so near that its inhabitants are neighbours; but a settlement twenty miles distant across the uncleared country is unknown, unvisited, and probably unheard of by the women and children. Under such circ.u.mstances the railway is everything. It is the first necessity of life, and gives the only hope of wealth. It is the backbone of existence from whence spring, and by which are protected, all the vital organs and functions of the community. It is the right arm of civilization for the people, and the discoverer of the fertility of the land. It is all in all to those people, and to those regions. It has supplied the wants of frontier life with all the substantial comfort of the cities, and carried education, progress, and social habits into the wilderness.

To the eye of the stranger such places as Seymour and Crossline are desolate and dreary. There is nothing of beauty in them, given either by nature or by art. The railway itself is ugly, and its numerous sidings and branches form a ma.s.s of iron road which is bewildering and, according to my ideas, in itself disagreeable. The wooden houses open down upon the line, and have no gardens to relieve them. A foreigner, when first surveying such a spot, will certainly record within himself a verdict against it; but in doing so he probably commits the error of judging it by a wrong standard. He should compare it with the new settlements which men have opened up in spots where no railway has a.s.sisted them, and not with old towns in which wealth has long been congregated. The traveller may see what is the place with the railway; then let him consider how it might have thriven without the railway.