The Home-Life of Salmon Portland Chase

THE complications of our political system often rob our greatest men of the privilege the poorest of their constituents enjoys, — a permanent abiding-place. The caprice with which a public favorite is sent first to Washington, and then, perhaps, remanded to his State capital, and then despatched to a foreign post of duty, makes it sometimes impossible that he can call any one spot his home. Under this disadvantage Mr. Chase labored, as one of so varied a public career must have done. When just about of age, he chose Cincinnati as a home and a starting-place. The recollections of his life there, when a boy, are known to have decided him in this choice ; but it was a preference the wisdom of which he never afterwards. doubted. Indeed, he often said in his later days, that, were he a young man, with his “life to live over again,”— that was his invariable way of putting it, — he would go still farther West. At Cincinnati he lived through the first struggles of a poor, young lawyer’s life, which was marked with peculiar embarrassments and vicissitudes, — the exciting slavery controversies and the fights for liberty in the courts, in which he bore himself so well. In 1849 his election as United States Senator broke in upon a life which had now become busy and prosperous, and placed him in an arena no longer bounded by the lines of his own State. In 1855 there was still another transfer, when Ohio demanded his services in the governor’s chair ; and it is still the pride of Ohioans, that Governor Chase was the first to take up his official residence at Columbus, and by this, as well as other means, to make his office something more than that of “ a big Justice of the Peace.” But this residence was of short duration. Being elected Senator a second time in 1860, he took his seat in the following year, and, after serving two days, became Secretary of the Treasury. From this time until the close of his life, Washington must be considered as his home. There was a lapse of only a few months during which he was not officially a resident there ; so that for the twelve years that passed between the opening of the conflict he did so much to bring to its successful issue, and his death, he was a resident of the capital. He still, however, retained his citizenship in the State of his adoption, and up to the last few years went home to vote, — a duty he urged upon others by speech and letter as well as by example.

During the latter years of his life, but before his paralytic attack, a yearning came over him, as it comes to so many lovers of Nature, to renew his old acquaintanceship with her in some retreat guarded from the busy sights and sounds of a city. The spot selected for his country home was necessarily near enough to town to permit daily and convenient attendance at Court, and yet was distant enough to withdraw him from bustle, and retired enough to shelter him from intrusion. It was no inconsiderable domain either ; its fifty-five acres came to be dubbed familiarly “the duchy.” It lies about two miles from the city, directly north of the Capitol, and has long been known as a tract which it was proposed to turn into a summer residence for the President, at least one resolution to this effect having been introduced into the Senate before the war, with the design, it is said, of placing the new Executive mansion where the house of the Chief Justice stood. This house, though built many years before, could hardly have been fashioned more to his tastes. Its dimensions were so generous that its building is said to have been interrupted for a time by lack of money, the father of the future owner admitting that he had “agreed to pay for a house, but not,” said he, “ for a capitol.” It is a plain, massive, threestory brick house, with nothing of modern architectural frippery about it; a house of ample halls, broad staircases, lofty ceilings, elaborate and old-fashioned mouldings, and walls that might stand for centuries. But its site is its chief beauty. It rises boldly from the brow of a hill, which slopes rapidly down in front and on both sides. On either hand, the ground descends to rise again in hills, over which the Chief Justice spent many an hour in leisurely walks. In front, it falls abruptly down and rolls away towards the Potomac, between two gentle ranges of hills ; this defile, widening as it advances, opens full upon the city, with its houses glistening clean and white in the sun, while the Capitol, in simple majesty, is the vanishing point of the picture. It is a most beautiful view and, unromantic as it is, has all the moods wilder scenes are so rich in. No vicissitude of storm or cloud can .rob it of its beauty. In the mist and haze of morning, the bright, full glow of noon, the thickening gloom of dusk, it still held its charm ; and, in all its phases, the Capitol, in which so much of the life-work of the veteran statesman had been done, was the centre around which the landscape seemed to group itself. In this beautiful spot he lived happily, free from care, though not from labor. He set himself, with all the eagerness of a convert, to learn the ways of farmer-life, watching with an enthusiast’s care the advance of his fruits and crops, walking daily over his little territory to inspect its condition, and often pushing into the woods and out on the hills beyond. It was a simple and unostentatious life, with nothing to mar its quietude.

Mr. Chase’s private life few men came to know ; comparatively few were allowed to enter it. It was quiet, and its seeming uneventfulness was due as much to the severe simplicity of his tastes as to the limited size of his home circle. But no one whose privilege it was to penetrate it could fail to observe at work the secret processes which made his life so fruitful in results. Mr. Chase’s abilities, without what a few knew to be his systematic habits, would have made him successful ; his methods, without his abilities, would have gained him distinction, if it be true that genius is mostly hard work ; but his abilities, aided by his habits, made it impossible that he should fail. He gained his official stations — certainly the last two and greatest — simply by force of what seemed to be his inherent powers, for he knew little of the ways of politicians, and was incapable of the arts of chicane ; but it would be robbing such a life of half its virtue for example and encouragement, should we overlook the well-planned and well-accomplished labor which charcterized it from beginning to close. First among his methods, he himself placed punctuality and system. He was as true to engagements as he was to his promise in everything, and showed the same alacrity in keeping an appointment with some one who was dependent upon him as with one of high social dignity. It was his pride to be at his post at the hour of duty, whatever it might be. He was never late on the Supreme Court bench until one morning last winter, when his watch was the real offender. And in this, as in everything else, while he demanded nothing from others he would not do himself, he exacted a rigid fulfilment of duty. He had no charity for laterising, tardiness, or shiftlessness. He was always a strict economist of time, and fixed, with a rule that knew little variation, the periods at which his day should begin and end. In his work, system was a necessity. His habit of preserving and arranging papers, acquired no doubt in public life, he continued and expanded in private matters as well. He seldom destroyed anything, whether letter, pamphlet, book, or circular. This methodical habit has made his collection of political papers one of great value. It is a storehouse of much of the vast uncollated and undigested history of the times in which he lived. Pamphlets, reports, speeches, newspaper cuttings, miscellaneous collections of all kinds indicate his provident turn of mind. His diaries lie kept with great minuteness and care, and continued them even when it had become a labor to hold his pen. They cover the whole period of his active life, and, though there are sometimes short gaps in them, they form, in connection with his other papers, a circumstantial personal history, which is equalled by that of few men in our annals. Locked in these treasure-houses is much of the secret and momentous history of war times, which may some day make or mar the fame of many a man, living and dead. One of his wise habits, exhibiting his characteristic caution, was that of requiring every proposition of any kind that was submitted to him to be made in writing. A proposal in relation to his farm ; the dimensions of anything and everything ; the smallest account, — must be carefully stated on paper. This was invariable with him. Good as his memory was, he never relied upon it when he could do otherwise, and would even require his secretary to take short-hand notes of a neighbor’s conversation, to retain his information upon farming topics. Among the manifestations of his careful and philosophical study of politics are old quartos in his library, in which are recorded votes and majorities in the different States, an instance of the compilation of yearbooks, long before such things were the product of every metropolitan press. Of course, in the crush of public business, he used other hands than his own in his necessary work, but he wrote himself with great rapidity and ease, though with a corresponding loss in legibility. His writing, when in health, was a peculiarly elastic, delicate, and almost fanciful hand ; after his paralytic attack, when for a length of time his pen was a burden, his hand was shorn of its curves, and became plain and heavy, though still elegant. At this period it was very condensed and minute, and occupied little more space than printed letters. His desk always exhibited characteristic order. He had no toleration for looseness or shiftlessness in such matters, and was a very martinet over his writing materials. Everything was to be in its proper place, and everything had its proper place assigned it. These things are only worthy of mention as indications of the character of the man. The order of his desk was but a type of the order he enforced on larger fields.

To his system and promptness, he added the great quality of perseverance. He was an unflagging worker, though often desultory. Although he sometimes forsook one line of labor for another, and then perhaps abandoned that for a third, he invariably returned to the first, and completed, either immediately or after an interval, anything he had set himself to do. He had the power of continued, persistent, and unremitting labor, which superficial and untrained workers could not follow. When in the Treasury, midnight and early morning often found him at his desk ; and with all the weight of the hazardous and critical transactions of those times bearing upon him, he could still work when secretaries and clerks broke down. It has often been asserted, and with a great show of truth, that the strain of body and brain to which he was here subjected, and which he was too conscientious not to meet, first impaired the strength which gave way in 1870, never to be fully restored. But on the other hand, there are those who believe that the sudden dismantling of power and privilege which followed his retirement, and the cessation of the engrossing, exciting work of the war, first set in motion the great reaction. There can be no doubt that the assassination of Mr. Lincoln had a marked influence upon him. Those who carried the news to him evidently lacked words to describe the horror which they saw come over him. He was in bed, reading, as he generally did, his prayer-book by the light of a little candle ; and upon the mind sinking into quiet after the labors of the day, and filled with thoughts of devotion, came the news with a rude and terrible shock.

At the period of his accession to the bench, as at every other, fidelity was his characteristic. He was thorough in all things, and demanded thoroughness from others. And to the inflexibility with which he maintained this high standard must be ascribed the final cause which broke down his great physique. At the time of his appointment as Chief Justice he had grown somewhat unused to legal methods, and deemed intense application to his books necessary for the renovation of his knowledge. Twelve hours a day are said to have been devoted to reading, and the only exercise of the day was an early walk around Judiciary Square. After some years a slight decrease in flesh was noticeable, and the decline in his health which set in terminated in the attack of paralysis. On his return to the bench, it was soon seen that his old conscientiousness had not deserted him. He assigned to himself a full share of the cases before the Court, and listened to no remonstrances as to the quantity of work he was undertaking. It was, perhaps, the unwillingness of a once vigorous worker to acknowledge himself unequal to his accustomed tasks, but it also resulted from his strict impartiality. Still, the statement so frequently made since his death — that for some years he had found it necessary to abstain altogether from continued mental labor — is absurdly untrue. The old power was gone, but there still remained sufficient to have equipped a number of younger men. The fidelity which placed him again on the bench kept him there through labors of which there is very little general comprehension. A seat on the Supreme Court bench involves no easy life. Sitting daily from eleven to three, hearing the dryest and most abstruse legal arguments ; meeting on Saturdays in “conference ” for the same number of hours, and going through the discussion of cases argued during the week, the ballot upon them, and the assignment to some judge of the preparation of the opinion ; the reading and acceptance or rejection of opinions already prepared; crowding into the intervals of time that remain during the week the research and writing which the preparation of these elaborate opinions involves ; and the absorbing and imperative social observances which no man of high official position can hope to shirk, — this means unremitting occupation that taxes the energy and ingenuity of the strongest men.

It is one of the least pleasant thoughts connected with the close of Mr. Chase’s life that it should have been sometimes clouded by malice or thoughtlessness. There sometimes came to, him through stray newspaper paragraphs, or chance gossip, some evidence of the caprice of that cheap republican gratitude which endures only so long as the public’s faithful servant is of use, and which, when there is a falter in the hand that was once so Strong and ready, demands his dismissal. But it is to the credit of the American heart that most of us remembered the services of Salmon P. Chase, and that, as a people, we dwelt on the memory of this arduous and unselfish life while, perhaps, here was a newspaper gossiping about the “ succession,” or a lawyer grumbling because a case was delayed. These things, when they pierced the barriers solicitous relatives and friends raised around him, could be seen to affect him deeply, though he never confessed it. But he bore no malice for them. It was with no bitterness, then, but with a shrewd and kindly smile, that he sometimes said, when his health was inquired about, — “I ’m not very well, but I ’m a great deal better than some people wish I was.”

He seemed to gain in physical strength as time passed, but during the last few days that he sat in Court a sudden weakness surprised him. His walk was not so firm ; his breath hardly lasted the ascent of Capitol Hill, which his feet had trodden for a quarter of a century. His voice was weaker ; his manners, always considerate, but sometimes abrupt through nervousness or illness, became gentler and kinder every day. His very silence was benignant. On the last day the Court was in session, he relinquished his place to his venerable friend and associate, Judge Clifford, and remained seated at his side, for the first and last time in his life, resting his head all day upon his hand. What thoughts oppressed him, or what shadow of the disaster so fast approaching drew its pall over his spirit, no man may know. In a little more than a week from that day his body lay in that very chamber robed in a more awful dignity than it had ever worn in life.

As the smallest details in the histories of great men are of value, a few words about the daily routine of Mr, Chase’s life may not be uninteresting. He was always an early riser, and he took a short walk or spent a few minutes over his books before breakfast. The morning prayers he read with solemnity, first gathering about him all the inmates of his house, down to the humblest domestic. From the breakfast-table he went, when Secretary, directly to the Treasury ; when Chief Justice there still remained an hour or more before it was necessary to leave for the Court. This was spent in his library in the preparations of his opinions, in writing or dictating letters, in interviews with friends, or leisurely perusal of the morning paper. He invariably walked to the Capitol when the weather permitted. The stretch from Edgewood to the Capitol was one that would have discouraged many a younger and more vigorous man ; it was over two miles of rough road, exposed in winter to the full sweep of cutting winds ; but the coldest morning, blowing fiercely at that, never dismayed him. Leaving the bench at three, he generally returned in his modest one-horse carriage. The evening was passed in study,reading, conversation with friends ; in the season, he could hardly escape a party or a reception. His amusements were few and simple. At one time, chess occupied a portion of almost every evening. Croquet he was very fond of, and played with the same zest when his hand had lost much of its strength and precision. The sight of cards was intolerable to him ; he would not suffer their presence in his house. Backgammon was one of his favorites, and he would often join in some children’s game with as much delight as the children themselves.

His will was his great power. This faculty in him, probably more than any other, contributed to his success. It was dominating and indomitable ; it yielded to no man and to no force ; its persistency was measured only by the length of the task to be accomplished, and its firmness increased with the weight of interests that depended upon it, and while it no doubt shortened his life, it again prolonged it. The tension of the war was wonderfully sustained, the strong will ruled triumphant over the strong body ; but it was a strain which could not last forever. Then followed the intense application to books and work which succeeded his accession to the bench, and the combined weight soon began to tell. All through these exciting and arduous periods he held himself firmly to his post. Then came the great shock that prostrated him, and first set the term beyond which he could hardly endure. At this, the will turned to repair its own ravages.

All its old force was now bent in the opposite direction of recovering his health. His food, his hours of rising, exercise, retiring, his continuance at work were regulated with precision and the rules inflexibly kept. By this careful ministering, he slowly brought himself up to comparative strength, and finally fairly lifted himself upon the bench. It is a question whether his wisest course would not have been to pass the rest of his days in quiet ; and there can be little doubt, from a number of his expressions, that, had Congress passed a law permitting the retirement of Judges at sixty-five upon their salaries, he would have seriously considered the wisdom of such a step. He certainly at one time felt an interest in legislation looking to that end. But while he was on the active roll, he was too proud to seem neglectful of his work, and too conscientious to receive even the disgraceful stipend the Republic doles out to her servants, without rendering what equivalent he could. That was rendered scrupulously to the very last; and, considering the faithful industry of his whole career and the height and nobility of that memorable life and figure, there was, after all, something fitting in the sudden crash with which he went down.

He was intellectually strong rather than quick. The characteristics of his mind were all practical rather than showy, and there was so little of display and so much of caution in its action that it sometimes seemed a little slow ; but its decision seldom needed to be reversed. His memory was always good, and in early life seems to have been remarkably retentive. His imagination, whether he repressed, or because he hid its workings, seldom discovered itself. Its graces seemed almost out of place amid such massive machinery. His reasoning powers were great by nature and education. They were bold and creative. His mind knew no grooves.

Few who ever saw Mr. Chase would need to be reminded of his personal dignity. It was the natural expression of a man who was conscious of his great abilities and who unconsciously thus shadowed them forth. Its naturalness was evinced by its continuousness. Mr. Chase at home in his library was very little different from the Chief Justice on the bench, save that he had parted with his gown. He could not have left his dignity behind him with that solitary symbol of his office if he had wished ; it was as natural to him as its reverse was sometimes to others. This presence, which was inseparable from him or any conception of him, seems to have surrounded him from the first. His very schoolmates felt it, and his associates on the bench were not free from its influence. It was a badge of superiority that all men seemed to acknowledge. His appearance fell with a hush on crowds. Such an order-compelling faculty made him a superb presiding officer. His masterly conduct of the Impeachment Trial is too much of a household story to need description; its impartiality, kindliness, firmness, and dignity can be seen even through the dense medium of the verbatim reports. In the slightest parliamentary details he required those who did not feel the solemnity of the proceeding in which they were engaged, to appreciate it. Neither in public nor at home did he permit any neglect of the observances due himself, and he resented any such negligence with spirit. An incident illustrating this occurred also during the trial. One of the most prominent of the managers put a question of considerable length to the Senate, which the Chief Justice requested that “ the Honorable Manager put in writing.” But the latter took no notice of the request. The Chief Justice quietly repeated it: “It will be necessary to reduce the question to writing, in order that it may be submitted to the Senate.” The pertinacious talker still went on, and then came the burst he might have expected : “Does the Honorable Manager refuse to put his question in writing?” It was an emphasis to which no italics could do justice. General Butler sat down as if he expected never to get up again.

Whatever may have been the degree of decorum preserved in the courtroom before Mr. Chase’s accession to the bench, it certainly suffered no diminution after that time. The relations that exist between the court and the bar are of the most cordial and respectful character, and render possible the dignity and good will that distinguish them both. No better indication of this can be found than the impressive opening of the session each day, in which the solemn procession of robed judges, greeted with respectful silence by the bar and spectators standing, marks the place as one of the last refuges of judicial dignity. There was something grand in the inspiration that seemed to seize the Chief Justice as he led in this distinguished little band. His form was braced with a sudden energy, his eye grew brighter. As he stepped upon the daïs, weak as he sometimes was, he towered proudly above those on either side. A glance to the right, then to the left, both Court and lawyers bow, and the monotonous tones of the crier announce that the Court is open. But to this uneventful life there were sometimes diversities. And while the bar was treated with the utmost consideration, on the other hand no laxity of demeanor was permitted. It is related, though I do not know with what accuracy, that the Chief Justice once rebuked a lawyer openly fora certain gaudiness of attire, and requested him, when again appearing, to present himself in more sober garments.

Mr. Chase’s physical proportions, aided by his natural presence, made him a man to be reverenced and feared, and men almost invariably did fear him. Only those who knew him well could throw off the feeling of constraint which his mere presence seemed to put upon them. Not that he was ever guilty of assumption ; he was as little conscious of exerting such an influence as they were able to resist it. Men who had held positions of trust under him for years in the Treasury never rid themselves of this feeling. Neither in private nor in public life was he ever called by any name other than his own, if we may except that of “Old Greenbacks,” which was current for a time ; and even this expresses in a rough way something of the popular reverence for him. But this was an exception ; there was something too statuesque in his proportions to admit of such familiarity. In private life, his dignity was tempered with affection, but was never absent. In public life, the enthusiasm that heaps endearing diminutives on its favorite, and insists perhaps on the privilege of contracting his first name, turned none of its boisterous regard upon him. He was popular indeed ; the beaming faces of Ohioans when they met “ Governor Chase,” and the applause that burst from the galleries of Tammany Hall when that historic half-vote was cast, were sufficient proof of his abundant popularity ; but he was a political leader and never a party protégé. His natural reserve gave him with some the reputation of being a very cold and unsympathetic man. There could not have been a greater mistake ; but whatever his feelings were, he often hid them and wrapped the cloak of his reserve about him.

The dramatic surprises of our politics are many, and Mr. Chase’s first election to the Senate was one of them. It lifted him from a comparatively modest position into the broad light of national prominence; but after that time his advance was a steady progress, and reached its culmination at its close. He was a veteran in work and experience when some who afterwards gained greater honors were obscure and untried. He was famous and trusted when all of our later Presidents were unknown and unhonored. From his first appearance in politics, he touched elbow to elbow with the first men of his time, and it is in this eventful series of companionships that the greatest public loss will be felt. There have been few lives so woven into the web of our later history, — few that so stretch through, color, and strengthen every part. Yet. notwithstanding this power of stamping his name indelibly on the hearts and minds of the men of his day, he was himself not a man who made friends, in the ordinary meaning of that expression. The very qualities which made him popular with the people were perhaps those which in private life would not draw men to him. His dignity gained him the favor of the masses, while the reserve which accompanied it did not always attract confidence, and his presence often overbore less confident men. Such intimate friends as Mr. Chase made were lasting and faithful, but their number was comparatively small ; the rest of his acquaintances really knew little of his private life and Character. The ordinary intercourse of official duty did not give them an insight into his inner nature, the secrets of which were reserved for a chosen few, who found in him a genial heart and ready hand.

The judicial habit of his mind was marked, though he sometimes seemed to think differently. He said more than once in a half-joking, half-serious way, “When I get on my thinkingcap and go to work at these cases, I try to be judicial, and think I am ; but I don't teel much like a judge at other times.” Whether this was a playful self-depreciation or not, it was unjust. He was always impartial. The equipoise he manifested in public matters was not assumed for public view. In the smallest personal concern, he was just as anxious to do exactly what was right and best as in the decision of a great question ; if he went wrong, it was an error of the judgment and not of the heart. And this was remarkably displayed in his judgment of men and of their frailties. The broad range of his comprehension took in every connected circumstance. His charity was boundless; and while there was never anything like cynicism in his nature, age had mellowed and not hardened his heart. He was as impartial in judging men who had injured him as men whom he had never known. If he had done any man injustice, he was always ready to acknowledge it; and a similar advance from one by whom he had been wronged never met with a repulse. Sometimes, in the whirl and perplexity of public business, he would address some one with less than necessary consideration ; many such he pursued with notes of apology, for he was always the first to discover that he had been hasty. These were trivial injuries, but they were almost the only ones he was ever obliged to redress ; for he was so even and so considerate that it may be boldly denied that he ever intentionally did any man a wrong in his life. An invisible robe of justice always encircled him. He was without bitterness, and those who built schemes upon his resentments often found themselves without a standingplace. But he was by no means callous ; his exquisitely sensitive spirit felt every attack, however slight. The deeper the wound, the greater, therefore, the magnanimity which forgot it.

Those who believe that the greatest men are the most sensible of their own defects will be glad to think that Mr. Chase’s modesty was one of the signs of his greatness. There was no subject about which he talked less than himself; he rarely or never referred to himself or his history in any way. There have been few men, with so much to remember, so little given to reminiscence. Not only would he seldom volunteer recollections, but it required the greatest skill even to draw them from him. His modesty as to the accuracy of his judgment led him always to speak carefully, and with provisos, where men of a tenth of his intellectual weight were dogmatic. It showed itself as much in his frankness in confessing lack of knowledge of various subjects as in anything. He had none of that pretentiousness which claims all knowledge as its own. Even when questioned on subjects with which he might be expected to be familiar, his plain answer was, again and again, “ I don’t know.”

In conversation he was both impressive and fascinating, both accurate and brilliant. He was never what is known as a conversationalist; never talked for effect, never strained the capacity of his auditors. And while his talk was often on that safe middle ground which requires neither sparkle nor erudition, it was always bright and picturesque, overflowing with illustra-

tions drawn from books and from observation. His conversations had no mannerisms, for it was never his wish to divert thought from the subject to himself.

His learning was derived almost entirely from books, for he cannot be said to have been a student of the external world, and seemed little versed in the lore of human nature. He often said that, when a boy living in the country, his whole mind was drawn by his hunger for books to study, and that he cared little for the beauties of nature, though in later life he was an enthusiastic lover of them. His ignorance of men — for such it seemed to be — was most strange. It is the deliberate estimate of some of those who knew him best, and an opinion expressed to him during his lifetime, that he knew little “of human nature,” as the phrase goes. Men’s motives seemed hidden from him ; an appearance of goodness would seem to him to be genuine, while to most others it was but a thin disguise. He had the habit of belief in men, in their sincerity, their purity of purpose, and, a hero himself, could indulge in hero-worship, His faith in men to whom it had once been pinned, sometimes remained unshaken long after disclosures and disgrace had befallen them. This charity, conspicuous in some cases, was no doubt often due to his knowledge of the cruel uncertainty of a good name in politics. Though his record is purity itself, he had been often and bitterly assailed, and knew on what slight foundations accusations often rest, and how less stalwart men might fail in the brave and unqualified proof of innocence. And yet this trustfulness often had something pathetic in it ; it was almost childlike in its innocence. An amusing circumstance in connection with this was a correspondence that took place a number of years ago between Mr. Chase and a friend, now a leading journalist. This friend had prepared a biographical sketch of Mr. Chase, in which this very opinion, or one very much like it, was stated at length, and before its publication it in some way reached his eyes. To this point he took exception, and wrote his friend a long letter, as the friend afterwards said, “ to prove that he knew something about human nature.” It is an evidence of the sincerity of that conviction, that even Mr. Chase’s protestations did not Shake it in the least. And yet it is almost enough to disprove this theory, to consider his appointments in his various positions. The men whom he chose almost invariably did their work well. He seemed to possess the sagacity that fits men to their places. His hand seemed to know the instrument it needed and how to use it. But, of course, its touch could not always be true. Some of his Treasury appointments turned out ill as many appointments of other secretaries did ; but which man would stand, and which man would fall in those troubled times, it was beyond human foresight to know. Those of whom you had expected most would squander in an hour the accumulated reputation of a lifetime.

To say that Mr. Chase was morally courageous would be a mere truism. When he thought he had discovered the path of duty, he followed it to the end, caring not whither it led him or what dangers beset it on either side. A young lawyer declaring himself against slavery in the midst of a society drawing its life from slavery ; a man accepting office at the hands of his opponents in the hope of bringing them to his views ; a Senator resisting almost alone the cohorts of slavery at the national capital; a Secretary upholding our arms with unflinching and splendid faith in their final success ; a Chief Justice sitting unmoved amidst the fiercest storm of political passion our history has known, and, later, passing official disapproval upon his former acts, — these are a few of the hasty glimpses one catches of him. This moral courage was always with him. There was nothing like social cowardice about him. He would never distort an opinion or swerve a hair’s-breadth from the truth, for fear of consequences. The peaceful pursuits of a civil life did not render necessary any great display of personal courage ; but it is at the same time interesting to note how much of a bent his mind had towards military affairs. With the aid of General McDowell, who had been one of his bitterest enemies and came out of the ordeal of 1861 perhaps his warmest admirer, he framed Orders No. 15 and 16, which were promulgated in May, 1861, the one regulating the enlistment of volunteers, and the other, of regular regiments. His counsel was constantly sought in such matters by the President and Secretary of War; and it is stated that the interests of the three great border States, Kentucky, Missouri, and Tennessee, were placed for a time under his control. During his term as Secretary, his first after-breakfast duty was the careful study and comparison of his atlases and the papers ; and he is said to have been as well acquainted with the positions of the troops in the field as any member of the government. It is a matter of which it is not yet time to speak definitely, but history will show, unless I am greatly mistaken, that at least one important capture of the war, the renown of which has been added to another name, was effected under Mr. Chase’s orders, written either in his own hand or in that of a clerk at his dictation. During the dark days of the conflict his composure steadied hundreds who were around him. On the day of the first battle of Bull Run, a noted English correspondent spoke of him in substance as the only member of the government who preserved his balance ; during the second battle of Bull Run his courage was still more remarkable. There was a veritable panic in Washington ; but through all the confusion, the Secretary transacted business quietly and systematically, his coolness unimpaired by the consternation of those around him. Some one asked him, “ Mr. Chase, what do you think will come of it ? ” His reply was, “ I trust in God’s providence.” And during the Impeachment Trial, when he was the object of bitter and unsparing denunciation from all sections of the country, he was as composed in mind as if presiding over the most monotonous term of the Supreme Court. Every day the newspapers thundered at him ; old friends denounced him in speech and in conversation ; and almost every day his mail brought him letters threatening his life. These were read, and after being laughed over quietly consigned to his waste-basket. Being a civilian, he was perhaps without that acute sense of his danger that impelled a certain prominent actor in that trial to throw himself upon the public for protection, and read his one threatening letter to his immense audience.

Humor seemed to be a little developed characteristic with him. The marvellous ramifications of the modern joke afforded him but little amusement ; it was never an easy matter to make him laugh, but at the same time his enjoyment of broad humor was often hearty and genuine. And yet he seldom told a story without spoiling it. An instance of this he once related himself in rehearsing old scenes with a friend who had been his ally in many a political campaign. In making a stumpingtour together, they had used a peculiarly apt and good story in common, and, to divide it fairly, told it on alternate days. He added, with a grim smile, “ B—— always made the people laugh, but I never could.” Although extremely sensitive to ridicule, such as newspapers might sometimes attempt, he now and then would tell a good story against himself; and one of the most amusing of these was an incident of his administration as governor of Ohio. During his first term, a man of weak mind had killed a neighbor, and was sentenced to a long term of imprisonment, but, on the urgent representations of many citizens, was pardoned by Governor Chase. Soon after, the hot contest for and against his re-election began ; and on electionday, while the vote was being closely watched by excited partisans, the pardoned man presented himself at the polls with a Payne ticket in his hand. “ What ! ” exclaimed some one in astonishment, “ are you going to vote against the man who pardoned you ?” “ O, Chase has pardoned too many scoundrels! ” was his ready reply. Mr. Chase had no very great fondness for comic literature, and still less when it was discussed or read at what he considered inappropriate times. Probably no more prominent instance of this could be given than the first Cabinet meeting at which he was present after the Emancipation Proclamation had been drafted. He came expecting to aid in the transaction of important business, and saw Mr. Lincoln take from his desk a copy of Artemus Ward, and heard him gravely read, as if by way of whimsical contrast to the vital business awaiting discussion, a chapter for the benefit of his assembled counsellors. Mr. Chase, in relating the incident, said in a quiet way that he lost patience at it, and probably his disapproval was not unexpressed.

His style in writing was concise and chaste. He wrote carefully, plainly, and accurately, In his official documents it would be hard to find an unnecessary or meaningless word. He was the most remorseless editor of his productions, and would erase line after line and page after page ; his legal opinions, models of clear, good English, would sometimes be rewritten, by his own or another’s hand, four or five times before they attained the degree of brevity and clearness requisite to secure his approval. A manuscript opinion which he had just corrected often looked more like a music-score than a legal document. So far did he carry this pruning process that some of his opinions, as they stand in the later volumes of Wallace, seem almost bald and insignificant; the brief statement of facts with which they were generally prefaced being separated, leaves the opinion proper of very modest length. But the verbosity of judges and lawyers was something he lamented and strove to correct. And to this feeling is due not only the brevity and terseness of these opinions, but another striking peculiarity, — the almost entire absence of law terms. The opinions are for the most part as intelligible to those who are ignorant of the law as to those who are versed in it. This simplicity was not only in accordance with his straightforward style, but was the result of constant care and watchfulness. Not only were Latin terms banished so far as possible, but he abjured even the comparatively unoffending and popular particle, “ said.” His own will is the last and most convincing instance of this habit. It makes a number of bequests, and covers something more than a page of letter-paper, written in a liberal hand.

Of strictly literary productions, he cannot be said to have left any of an enduring nature. He wrote verses, both in early and later life, translations of Martial, verses upon a friend’s name, odes and sonnets, but they are to be regarded simply as recreations. There were also articles which he contributed to the Western magazines and to the North American Review ; and there still remain among his papers manuscripts of brief historical studies and translations from French financial works. Perhaps the latest of his writings, which is interesting on that account, was the introduction to the new edition of Edward Livingston’s works, written but a little more than a year ago at the request of Mrs. Livingston Barton, whose death so soon followed that of Mr. Chase. His political writings were many and varied, and marked by brevity, clearness, and force. The address of the antislavery convention at Columbus, Ohio, in December, 1841, which Vice-President Wilson says gave “ cohesion and impulse to the new organization ” ; the call for a Free Territory State Convention at the same city seven years later ; the platform of the Buffalo Convention of the same year; the letter to the Hon. B. F. Butler of New York, proposing the formation of an independent Democratic party; the platform of the Pittsburg Convention called in pursuance of that idea; the appeal to the people in 1854 against the repeal of the Missouri Compromise ; the letter of May, 1868, to the chairman of the National Democratic Committee, — are the most prominent of this remarkable series of political papers. Their influence on the history of the country can hardly be overestimated. Among the brief passages from his pen, destined to immortality, is the noble closing sentence of the Emancipation Proclamation,— a sentence without which it would have lacked the dignity of a righteous deed done by a religious people. Mr. Chase had a peculiar facility in compressing into a few words a popular principle or sentiment, and despatching it on its errand as a watchword. Perhaps the most famous of these was the phrase, “ Inauguration first, adjustment afterwards,” which, during the critical days between Lincoln’s election and inauguration, stood at the head of loyal newspaper columns and expressed the sentiment of the undivided North. Most of his private letters exhibited so much of his habitual condensation that they were often comparatively uninteresting, and he certainly seemed to be wanting in the knack of details that make up the charm of letterwriting. Yet he often wrote beautifully. A friend who had lost an only son would receive a letter he would cherish to his dying day ; to a worthy cause in need of encouragement and impetus, he would send ringing words of cheer. He could “ cut a colossus from a rock, but could not carve heads upon cherrystones.”

He was all his life an omnivorous reader. It was in his desultory reading as a boy that he found the pleasure in the company of a law-book which finally decided him in the choice of his profession. He never seemed to have read in pursuance of any plan, except perhaps on some few particular subjects, but to have followed his inclination. A comprehensive knowledge of the world’s history acquired in early life served him mainly to the end, for he found little time to make additions to it, except through the medium of newspapers and transient publications ; and in this way he maintained an accurate knowledge of European politics. In biography, Boswell was his only favorite ; though, among contemporaneous works, Lamon’s Life of Lincoln he esteemed as a faithful attempt at the portraiture of its subject. Essays and writings of the terse, epigrammatic kind seemed to please him ; but fiction did not satisfy his appetite, and he had comparatively little acquaintance with it. Among the English poets, Milton was his favorite, and was often quoted ; among the Latin, Horace stood first, Virgil next. The former of the Latin poets he read constantly during the later years of his life, keeping it generally by his bed and reading it often far into the night. I would not feel justified in repeating an apt quotation he made from one of the Satires in reference to what is known as the “backpay ” enactment of the last Congress, had lie not been so unreserved in expressions of his opinion to members of that Congress, and had not his views found their way into the public prints. It was during an afternoon walk, while discussing what seemed to him the indifference of the supporters of that measure to public opinion, that he recalled the lines,

It is an instance of the readiness with which his mind could turn from one subject to another and his unflagging industry, that he found time, in all the wearing and multitudinous duties of the Treasury, to revive his study of French, and spend a portion of every day in reading in that tongue.

A peculiarity derived both from the strength of his religious convictions and his innate refinement was his abhorrence of profane swearing and profane swearers. He must be a bold man who would swear twice in his presence ; the rebuke of his angry eye would shame the coolestor most flippant man into silence. Once, while Secretary, a visitor of great political influence used some profane expression in conversation with him. He turned on him. “Mr.——,” said he, “you may swear in the presence of other men, if you choose, but you sha’ n’t swear in mine.” On another occasion a man of still higher political position, but coarse manners, opened the conversation with a string of profanity. Mr. Chase said nothing ; but the contempt and indignation exhibited in his manner soon froze the tongue of the rough Westerner; and, hardened swearer as he was, he stopped short in his confusion, and left the room without another word.

In religious matters, Mr. Chase’s reserve closed his lips,— a silence which was seldom broken. A strict observer all his life of all religious requirements, he never made dogmas or rites the subject of discussion. Occasionally, with some intimate friend, he would speak reverently and cautiously “of things invisible to mortal sight ” ; but such confidence was very rare. He had a firm and abiding faith in the great fundamental truths of the Christian religion ; and, bearing his belief in his breast, proclaimed it only in the rectitude of his walk in life. He had little thought for denominational lines, and was entirely without sectarianism ; in this sphere of opinion, as in every other, he was distinguished by the broadest Catholicism.

While nothing that I might say could add to his renown, I can at least bear testimony to the spotlessness of his life. The breezes that rustle around his tomb these sweet autumn days are not more pure than the air in which he lived. Into that calm and healthful atmosphere came no rude or tainted breath. In hours of the greatest freedom, I never saw anything, or heard anything, or heard of anything that was not in accordance with the strictest rules of morality and courtesy. To those that knew him, such a disclaimer may seem not only unnecessary but out of place ; but to those who did not, such an example is too rare and fragrant to lose. Great as were his achievements, his home was the greatest of them.

Demarest Lloyd.