xt7jm61bkm9m https://exploreuk.uky.edu/dips/xt7jm61bkm9m/data/mets.xml McElroy, Robert McNutt, 1872-1959. 1923  books b92-234-31280957v1 English Harper, : New York ; London : Contact the Special Collections Research Center for information regarding rights and use of this collection. Cleveland, Grover, 1837-1908. Grover Cleveland, the man and the statesman  : an authorized biography (vol. 1) / by Robert McElroy. text Grover Cleveland, the man and the statesman  : an authorized biography (vol. 1) / by Robert McElroy. 1923 2002 true xt7jm61bkm9m section xt7jm61bkm9m 























  GROVER CLEVELAND

THE MAN AND THE STATESMAN


       VOLUME ONE

           to

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GROVER



CLEVELAND



THE MAN AND THE STATESMAN
        An Authorized Biography


                BY
ROBERT McELROY, PH.D., LL.D., F.R.H.S,
       EDWARDS PROFESSOR OF AMERICAN HISTORY
            PRINCETON UNIVERSITY



VOLUME
  I



HARPER & BROTHERS PUBLISHERS
   NEW YORK AND LONDON
         MCMXXIII

 






























GROVER CLEVELAND

THE MAN AND THE STATESMAN



   Copyright, I923
By Harper & Brothers

Printed in the U. S. A.

 


















             To
          My Wife
whose vermilion pencil deprived
the world of my noblest sentences

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                    CONTENTS

                      VOLUME I

 CHAPTER                                           PAGE
   I HEREDITY AND ENVIRONMENT. . . . . . . .          I

   II THE VETO MAYOR . . . . . . . . . . .           24

 III THE REFORM GOVERNOR . . . . . . . . .          37

 IV THE MUGWUMP CAMPAIGN OF i884     . . . . .     72

 V  ALONE IN THE WHITE HOUSE   . . . . . . . 100

 VI FACING THE POLITICAL BREAD-LINE . . . . . . 117

 VII THE INDEPENDENCE OF THE EXECUTIVE   . . . . 166

 VIII CLEVELAND AND THE VETERANS OF THE CIVIL WAR   . I89

 IX  CLEVELAND AND THE WARDS OF THE NATION, THE
       AMERICAN INDIANS   . . . . . . . . . 2I8

  X  CLEVELAND, BISMARCK, AND SAMOA. . .   . . . 240

  XI THROWING AWAY THE PRESIDENCY  . . . . . . 264

XII RETIRES TO NEW YORK   . . . . . . . . . 302

XIII AN UNPRECEDENTED RESTORATION  . . . . . . 324

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INTRODUCTION



   We have been told recently that there are too many
biographies. The complaint indicates a sense of com-
pulsion to read them. This can come only from a belief
that they probably contain something which ought not to
be overlooked. The real ground of the condemnation,
therefore, is not that biographies are not worth reading,
but that they ought to be read and that they therefore
impose additional obligations upon men who may perhaps
feel overburdened. The condemnation thus becomes a
justification.
   The most obvious appeal of a biography to the gen-
erations which have direct or close knowledge ot the man
written about; which have knowledge of the things he
has done, of the affairs in which he has played part, of
the men with or against whom he has worked-is really a
very narrow and minor function of biography. The more
important function is as an effective mode of presenting
history for the benefit of the future, which has to get its
knowledge entirely from books or traditions. Biography
makes a period interesting by throwing a high light on
a central figure and establishing a relation between all
the conditions and incidents of the time with that figure.
If only one of the significant figures of a period were
made the subject of biography there would be an effect
of disproportion due to overemphasis. But that is sel-
dom if ever the case. Men worth writing about are
naturally grouped in periods. Their biographies repro-
duce the same background with different emphasis. On
                         rii

 
INTRODUCTION



looking at the period from all these different points of
view taken together, we see life in the round standing out
from the canvas, with a quality of human interest which
it seems quite impossible for any impartial historian to
create. Of course there must be balance. If you read
Morley's Gladstone you must read Moneypenny's Dis-
raeli and the rest of the great Victorian biographies. If
you read the life of Jefferson you must also read the lives
of Hamilton, and of Marshall and of Adams. If you
read Cavour you must also read Garibaldi and Maz-
zini. The important question is not whether there are
too many or too few biographies, but whether the biog-
raphy of an important period in the world's life is well
balanced, whether all the personal points of view, from
which enlightenment and correction may come, are ade-
quately represented, so that the aggregate biographies of
a period as a whole will convey a correct as well as an
interesting conception.
   The biography of Grover Cleveland, which Professor
McElroy has now completed with great labor and sym-
pathy, is of special importance to the understanding of a
very critical period in American history-the period of
readjustment to the new conditions created by the Civil
'War. The readjustment involved, not merely a recovery
from the enormous losses of the war which included the
entire abolition of property in slaves, but also the great
reconciliation between the peoples of the two sections,
who, after four years of fighting, of killing and wounding
each other, were to try the experiment of living together
again as parts of the same people sharing in the conduct
of the same government. It was a reconciliation which
had to be effected by the same generation which fought
the war, because if that generation died unreconciled, be-
queathing its resentments and hatreds to a younger gen-
                          Vill

 
INTRODUCTION



oration, the undertaking would have been almost hope-
less. Inherited hatreds are almost ineradicable. That
the reconciliation was effected within the life of that gen-
eration and that survivors of the Union and Confederate
Armies came to work together with harmony and mutual
confidence in the government at Washington, is one of
the greatest of American achievements. It was not an
easy process but it was aided by two reactions in the sober
sense of the North. One, the reaction against the grave
error of reconstruction legislation which wvent upon the
theory that by merely giving a vote to the negro he would
be made competent to govern. The North became rather
ashamed of the exercise of power which inflicted real in-
justice upon the people of the South by the application
of this false theory. The other reaction, also in the
dominant North, was against the undue use made by
political managers for personal and organization pur-
poses, of the old spirit and memories and shibboleths of
the war. For the first twenty years after the war these
feelings served to control in the selection of the members
of government at Washington. But as the dominant
political organization during this long lease of power be-
came more compact and autocratic great numbers of
people in the North who sympathized with the war feel-
ing became quite unwilling that it should be utilized for
the benefit of a political organization in which they had
no practical voice. Under these circumstances the Demo-
cratic party, which could not hope to secure control in
the nation except by Southern votes, was fortunate enough
to find in Mr. Cleveland a man of such a strong person-
ality and such clearly demonstrated capacity upon lines
quite outside of the old Civil War contest, that his nomi-
nation for the Presidency would divide the Northern vote.
   As we look back forty years we can see that it was
                          ix

 
INTRODUCTION



time for new motives to assert themselves in American
politics. There could not be a real reunion of States in
patriotic sympathy without moral as well as legal am-
nesty, without really letting bygones be bygones. So long
as the control of government turned upon the sympathies
and resentments of the Civil Wiar it was inevitable that
there should be a sense of proscription by the defeated
party which revived bitter feelings upon both sides in
every election. The only way in which a change could
come was by making the control of government turn upon
the new issues which the developing life of the country
was bringing on and which did not depend at all upon
the old Civil War divisions. There is a certain satis-
faction in considering how perfectly Mr. Cleveland was
adapted to the requirements of that situation. He was a
Northerner and a Democrat, and so available. He was
a party man without answering to the ordinary conception
of a politician. He belonged to a party as a natural in-
cident to the business of citizenship. He inherited tradi-
tions from the earlier days, not so very far remote, when
it was considered every man's business to do his part
towards maintaining the peace and order of the com-
munity. He accepted that as a part of a normal Ameri-
can life; but he never was a political leader in a personal
sense and he never tried to be. He never tried to collect
about himself any group of followers who would promote
his fortunes in the expectation that he would promote
theirs. As an incident in the career of a young lawyer
he came to be appointed Assistant District Attorney in
Buffalo and in that subordinate office he exhibited qual-
ities which led after a time to his being made sheriff, and
then mayor of Buffalo, and then governor of the State of
New York. He had strong common sense, simplicity
and directness without subtlety, instinctive and immov-
                          I

 
INTRODUCTION



able integrity, perfect courage, a kindly nature with great
capacity for friendship and with great capacity also for
wrath which made him a dangerous man to trifle with.
There was nothing visionary or fanatical about him, but
he had a natural hatred for fraud and false pretense, and
a strong instinct for detecting the essential quality of con-
duct by the application of old and simple tests of morality.
There was no self-seeking about him. In all his public
employments he thought about his job and not about him-
self. His official judgment was never disturbed by any
question as to the effect upon his personal fortunes. He
had an exceptionally good mind; a still more exception-
ally rugged strength of character; altogether a powerful
and attractive personality. When the Presidential nomi-
nations of 1884 came to be made Grover Cleveland in his
various offices had done more of the honest and cour-
ageous things which good government requires and which
decent people like to have done, than any other Democrat.
That made him the available candidate to change the
current of American politics. His election upon that
record practically closed the old era of politics dominated
by the past and began the new era of politics looking to
the future. The strength and courage of his administra-
tions as President confirmed the new departure. No
thoughtful and patriotic American, to whatever party he
may belong, and however much his opinions may differ
from those of Mr. Cleveland, can read the story of those
administrations without admiration and sympathy, or
without a sense of satisfaction that his country can on
occasion produce and honor such a man as Grover
Cleveland.
                                     ELIHU ROOT.

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  GROVER CLEVELAND
THE MAN AND THE STATESMAN

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       GROVER CLEVELAND


                   CHAPTER I

            HEREDITY AND ENVIRONMENT

     "If a man were permitted to make all the homes, he need
   not care who should make the laws of a nation."
                             -GROVER CLEVELAND.

ET HE task of the historian is to separate truth from the
     propaganda of the past, and in the case of a biog-
raphy this task is often rendered most difficult by the
attempts of the subject to prepare his biographer's way
before him. But Grover Cleveland made no such at-
tempt. His mind was occupied with present duties, not
future fame, and he was content to allow the muse of
history to write her verdict without his personal aid. As
a result we have neither autobiography nor personal
memoir to guide or to misguide us. What we know of
Grover Cleveland, the man, has been gathered almost
wholly from his contemporaries, and from casual refer-
ences in letters and speeches written with no thought of
the verdict of history. What we know of Grover Cleve-
land, the statesman, has been culled from documents
equally guiltless of propaganda. For, although in later
life he published a number of monographs dealing with
important incidents in his presidential career, they are,
one and all, as impersonal as a presidential message or an
executive order; and this is the more remarkable in a
man who passed into history before he passed into silence.

 
GROVER CLEVELAND



   Accordiag to certain genealogical tables which Dr.
David Starr Jordan has examined and accepted,
G.mover C(icveland, George Washington, King Henry V
cf Eimgiand, Theodore Roosevelt, Robert E. Lee, Henry
Adams, Jonathan Edwards, Ulysses S. Grant, Benjamin
Harrison, Patrick Henry, Thomas Jefferson, J. Pier-
pont Morgan, and John D. Rockefeller were descended
from a common ancestry, "each showing one of the many
'direct lines' leading down from Isabel de Vermandois,"
who died in i13i.
   Although interesting, this appears of little real signifi-
cance, since, as the same authority points out, every
person now living would find, should he count back, that,
allowing three generations to a century, he has had more
than one hundred and thirty-four million ancestors
since the year i ioo, and more than twice that number if
he counted 'intervening forbears."
   But genealogical studies had little interest for Mr.
Cleveland. His indifference to his personal history was
equaled by his lack of interest in his family history; and
it is due solely to the efforts of others that in England we
can trace his family line to the Norman conquest and
beyond, while in this country we follow it through
all the generations which make up the history of the
American people since 1635, when Moses Cleveland
landed in Massachusetts, an indented apprentice from
Ipswich.
   The name Cleveland is of Saxon origin. The estate
or the district Cleveland, near the historic town of
Whitby, was so called "because of the clefts or cleaves
which abounded there." In early days the name was
spelled Cliveland, Clyveland, Clievland, Cleivland,
Cleaveland, Clevland, Cleveland, Cleffland, Clifland, or
in other ways, if others be possible, according to the



2

 
HEREDITY AND ENVIRONXIENT



fancy of the writer. Such liberties were taken with all
names in those happy days of phonetic freedom. But
Cleveland or Clyveland, Cliveland or Clifland, every
line of the family runs back to England. The genealog-
ical tree is a veritable English oak, with no branch
grafted from the Continent.
   Starting with Moses, born in I624, the American
branch very properly passes to Aaron, and for four con-
secutive generations the oldest son bears the latter name.
In I770, however, William Cleveland appeared to break
the succession, and his son, Richard Falley Cleveland,
was Grover Cleveland's father.
   Richard Falley Cleveland was born at Norwich, Con-
necticut, June i9, 1804. He receive' 'is college train-
ing at Yale, where he took high honors s of the class of
1824. Soon after graduation, his aim oeing the Pres-
byterian ministry, he accepted a post as tutor in Balti-
more, where he began his theological studies and at the
same time earned enough money to make possible a few
months in the Princeton Theological Seminary. In I828,
he was ordained, and accepted the pastorate of the First
Congregational Church at Windham, Connecticut. He
had, however, left his heart in Baltimore, and in 1820
he returned to recover it, and with it her in whose keep-
ing he had left it, the gentle Ann Neal.
   Ann Neal, the mother of Cleveland, has left few traces
to aid the biographer eager to do her justice. W'e know
that she was of Irish and French descent, that her father
was a publisher of law books in Baltimore, and that she
was born in that city on February 4, i8o6; but beyond
that we know little except that love came early into her
life in the handsome person of Richard Cleveland, and
that her devotion stood the test of time, changing con-
ditions, and an always scanty income. A country clergy-



3

 


man's life in those days meant constant sacrifice, and
Ann Neal's sacrifice began when as a bride she returned
with her husband to Windham where, in conformity
to prevailing local standards, she willingly gave up
many innocent enjoyments that the minister's influence
might not be jeopardized, or the cause they both loved
weakened.
   When Ann left her father's house, her colored maid,
who had cared for her from infancy, begged to be allowed
to accompany her. Thus attended, and rejoicing in many
bright articles of personal adornment, she entered the
New England manse only to find that colored maids were
regarded as unnecessary luxuries, and objectionable, as
savoring of slavery. She soon understood also that
jewelry was unbecoming a minister's wife. So the faith-
ful servant was cheerfully returned to her Southern home,
the treasured little ornaments were laid aside without a
sigh, and the bright heart of Ann Neal Cleveland beat
under costumes suitable to the wife of a village minister
of New England. But the young couple were poor only
in goods. They had education, culture, congeniality, and
spiritual wealth-resources sufficient to encourage hope
of a happy future.
   The young wife was not long called upon to walk in
the ways of the Puritan. In i833 the field of their joint
labors was transferred to the more familiar atmosphere
of Portsmouth, Virginia; and two years later they settled
down to the seven years of Richard Cleveland's pastorate
at Caldwell, New Jersey.
   The Cleveland family had growi since the days in
Windham. Two children, Anna, and William Neal,
had been born in Connecticut, Mary Allen during the
brief pastorate at Portsmouth, and Richard Cecil almost
as soon as the trunks were unpacked in the little manse



GROVER CLEVELAND



4

 
HEREDITY AND ENVIRONMENT



at Caldwell. Less than two years later, on March [8,
i837, the fifth child was born, and they called him
Stephen Grover in honor of the late pastor, whose service
at Caldwell had lasted almost half a century, and whose
name was there greatly beloved.
   In 184i Reverend Richard Cleveland accepted a call
as pastor of a church in Fayetteville, New York, and to
Fayetteville, with the others, went the young Grover,
traveling the way of the patient, on an Erie Canal boat,
which in those days was a method so slow that the Cleve-
lands were weeks on the journey. Fayetteville, in 1841,
was a quiet village, with a good academy, which served
the older Cleveland children both as educational and
social center. But there were no kindergartens in those
days and the education of Grover, the four-year-old, had
to wait. His training, however, did not wait. Filial
reverence, strict obedience, unquestioning belief in pa-
rental wisdom, and ready compliance with parental com-
mands were the presuppositions of life, according to the
Puritan creed which dominated the family. "Often and
often as a boy," he declared in later years, "I was com-
pelled to get out of my warm bed at night, to hang up a
hat or other garment which I had left on the floor."
   The commands of the Bible, the memorizing of the
Westminster Catechism, the strictest observance of Sun-
day as the Puritan had understood it, were the elements
upon which the character of Grover Cleveland were
built. Father, mother, and nine children were all sup-
ported by the minister's salary, which seldom exceeded
six hundred dollars a year.
   Under such conditions, simple, cultivated, religious,
Grover Cleveland passed the most formative years of his
life. With the help of the academy and of his intelligent
and well-trained father, he acquired a reasonable pro-



5

 
GROVER CLEVELAND



ficiency in Latin and mathematics, and an interest in
religious questions which lasted throughout his life.
   In the home of his childhood vexed questions such
as Sabbath observance were not debated. Each child
understood that six days were made for work and play,
and one for worship. CWhen the long shadows began to
fall on Sabbath eve, playthings were put away, clothes
carefully arranged for use on the morrow, an early supper
was prepared, in order that there might be ample time
for the weekly bath, at which the elder sisters assisted
with conscientious thoroughness. For clean hands as
well as a pure heart were considered appropriate accom-
paniments of the day of rest.
   While the steaming tubs were playing their part on
one side of the kitchen, the one servant, a self-respecting
Canadian woman, was preparing the material for Sunday
dinner on the other. A peck of potatoes, the roast, the
rice pudding with its spices and raisins, all had to be got
ready on Saturday.
   When the little Clevelands, with ears shining and at
times with hearts resentful at the memory of too vigorous
gouging, had been tucked into bed, the elder members of
the family retired to the church to practice hymns for
the service of the morrow. Sunday was itself a discipline
-two sermons a day, with Sunday school between, and
a prayer meeting in the evening which, on the first Sunday
(f each month, took the form of a missionary lecture and
always closed with the singing of the hymn, "From Green-
land's Icy Mountains."
   WVith the end of afternoon service, the strain of piety
wvas a little lightened, and the family assembled for a
substantial meal at three-thirty. A walk in the garden
or in the orchard beyond the house followed, and at twi-
light the pastor met his family for an hour of private



6

 
HEREDITY AND ENVIRONMENT



worship. Then the little ones were sent to bed, while
their elders returned to the church for an evening meeting.
   Such was the atmosphere in which Grover Cleveland
passed his childhood. It inevitably tended to produce a
keen sense of personal responsibility, to make trustworthy
character; for its ethical basis was absolute. It taught
that there is a right which is eternally right, and a wrong
which must remain forever wrong.
   To one of Mr. Cleveland's sisters we are indebted for
the following memory which shows how early the sense
of responsibility was developed in the boy: "It was a
very busy day and the last baby was more than usually
troublesome. Grover was pressed into service as baby-
tender, and encouraged to believe that sleep would soon
end his task. The vision of a little round-faced, blue-eyed
boy rocking a cradle, with a far-away look out of the
window where the 'fellers' were sliding down the hill,
is very clear in my memory. His heart was with the boys,
but his hand steadily kept the cradle in motion.
   "The wide-open eyes of the infant were met by Grover
with an hypnotic stare, as he monotonously droned out
the refrain, ' 'T is a sin to steal a pin, and how much more
a greater thing.' He tried all keys and all modulations;
but the baby smile persisted, and the baby eyes watched
every motion with a sleepless interest.
   "Convinced at last that the combined concert and pan-
tomime were too exciting, Grover changed his tactics. He
suddenly disappeared beneath the cradle, hushed his lulla-
by, and moved the rockers, slowly and quietly, back and
forth, from his unseen position. After a few moments,
he rose stealthily, and peered cautiously over the side of
the cradle, only to be greeted by that same baby smile,
and those wide-open baby eyes. Then, with a despair-
ing glance out of the window toward the hill where the



7

 
GROVER CLEVELAND



'fellers' slid, and with tears in his blue eyes, Grover
Cleveland dropped resignedly to the floor again, and
resumed his monotonous rocking. There he lay, listening,
sobbing and doing his duty, until relieved by an older
sister who came to the rescue."
   Alvah Woodworth, once proprietor of the iron
foundry at Manlius, New York, has left us the story of
how Grover Cleveland and the Bangs boys prepared to
hail a certain glorious fourth of July. They had gathered
a little wagon-load of old iron and brought it to Wood-
worth to be melted and molded into a cannon.
   "Puffing and perspiring," he says, "they toiled along,
one boy between the shafts, pulling, and the other two
back of the wagon, pushing. When they had arrived op-
posite the village foundry, they halted. One of the boys-
he was the youngest and shortest of the trio-then made
it known . . . that they desired to exchange their load
of old iron in return for a small cannon, which the pro-
prietor was to make for them in time to use in their
fourth of July celebration.
   "The foundryman weighed up the iron and found
that there was not a sufficient quantity to pay for the job.
This rather staggered the boys for a moment, but their
spokesman [Grover Cleveland], who seemed to be a lad
of resources, soon found a way out of the difficulty. His
proposition was that the foundryman should go ahead
and make the cannon, and after the arduous work of the
fourth was disposed of he and his fellow patriots would
drag up another load of iron to square up accounts. The
proprietor of the foundry looked the boys over keenly
and decided he could trust them. So the cannon was
made and used and, true to their word, the boys delivered
to the foundryman a second load of old iron as payment
for the balance they owed him."



8

 
HEREDITY AND ENVIRON MENT



   That this was done promptly we can infer from Gro-
ver 's appreciation of the value of time, as shown by an
essay which he wrote at the age of nine:
             Fayetteville Academy Sept. 5, I846.
                       Tim e.
   Time is divided into seconds-minutes, hours, days,
weeks month years and centurys. If we expect to become
great and good men and be respected and esteemed by
our friends we must inprove our time when we are young.
George Washington inproved his time when he was a
boy and he was not sorry when he was at the head of a
large army fighting for his country. A great meny of
our great men wer poor and had smal means of obtaining
an education but by improving their time when they were
young and in school they obtained their high standing
Jackson was a poor boy but he was placed in school and
by improving his time he found himself a president of
the United States guiding and directing a powerful nation.
If we wish to become great and usful in the world we
must improve our time in school.
                             S. G. CLEVELAND.

   That the atmosphere of Fayetteville did not always
breed progressive and enlightened citizens is abundantly
demonstrated by a letter which President Cleveland re-
ceived, two years after he entered the White House:

                  March 22, 1887.
Grover Cleveland
Washington
D C
DEAR GROVER
   Hank Stebbins told me the other day that you was
elected president I just couldnt believe it-I often won-



9

 
GROVER CLEVELAND



derd whare you was-I haint herd of you for years . . .
I have got a good job . . . here but I would like to live in
Washington-Can you give me a job there for the sake
of old times-Sallie Hornakers is dead had a rising.
Please rite to your old friend and schoolmate.

   For nine years Richard Cleveland served the people
of Fayetteville as pastor. Then his health began to fail,
and the strain of sustaining so large a family upon so
meager a salary was heavy. When, therefore, the Amer-
ican Home Missionary Society offered him an agency
with a salary of iooo a year, he accepted the appoint-
ment, which involved a change of residence to Clinton,
N. Y. The move was made in i 85 i, when Stephen Grover
was fourteen years of age, but he always remembered
with pleasure those youthful days at Fayetteville. In
after years, as President of the United States, he returned
for a flying visit, and his brief speech is one of the few
autobiographical touches that he left among his papers.
   "As I find myself once more in this pretty village,"
he said, "the sports and pastimes of my youth come back
to my mind. I take warm interest in being with you once
more. Some of you more than forty years ago were
my schoolfellows and playmates. I can recall the faces
of some that are now no more.
   "I have been reminded to-day by an old resident of
the many deaths which occurred among those I knew
since I took my departure from you, and I was astonished
to find that I could remember so many of the old names
in driving from the foot of the street to the parsonage
and the academy. There were Cobb, Parker, Gillett,
McVicker, Worden, Palmer, Horner, Edwards, Noble,
Deacon Flint, and many others. I recall old Green Lake
and the fish I tried to catch and never did, and the tra-



1O

 
HEREDITY AND ENVIRONMENT



ditional panther on its shores which used to shorten my
excursions thitherward. I've heard so much howling in
the past two years that I don't think I should be frightened
by the panther now.
   "If some of the old householders were here I could
tell them who it was that used to take off their front gates.
I mention this because I have been accused of so many
worse crimes since I have been in Washington that I con-
sider taking off gates something of a virtue.
   "I would be sadly at fault if I failed to recall the
many inestimable benefits I received at your hands-my
early education, the training of the Sunday school, the
religious advantages, the advantages of your social life.
These are things which have gone with me in every step
in life. And so, when in short intervals of freedom from
the cares and duties of my office, my mind revels in re-
trospection, these early recollections are the truest, pleas-
antest, and brightest spots on which my memory lights.
   "And so, you see, I have taken you and your village
with me, and whether you are willing or not, I have made
you a part of this administration. I have been a sad
truant, but, now that you have seen me, keep your eyes
ever upon me as I strive to do my duty in behalf of the
people of this country. And it shall be my desire so to
act that I may receive the approbation of these, my oldest
and best friends."
   At Clinton the Cleveland children enjoyed educa-
tional advantages far superior to those of Fayetteville, and
the atmosphere of Hamilton College fostered in Grover
the ambition already created by the influence of a
scholarly father and a mother wise enough to understand
the supreme advantages of a thorough intellectual train-
ing. But his brief sojourn here failed to develop in him
any unusual scholarly gifts. As a student he did not shine.



I I

 

GROVER CLEVELAND



The wonderful powers of application and concentration
which later distinguished him were not yet apparent. He
made friends more effectively than grades, and his friend-
ships lasted.
   He has himself left us an account of his Clinton days:
   "It was here, in the school at the foot of College Hill,
that I began my preparation for college life and enjoyed
the anticipation of a collegiate education. We had two
teachers in our school. One became afterward a judge
in Chicago, and the other passed through the legal pro-
fession to the ministry, and within the last two years was
living farther WNest.
   "I read a little Latin with two other boys in the class.
I think I floundered through four books of the fEneid.
The other boys had nice large modern editions of Virgil,
with big print and plenty of notes to help one over the
hard places. 'Mine was a little old-fashioned copy which
my father used before me, with no notes, and which was
only translated by hard knocks. I believe I have for-
given those other boys for their persistent refusal to allow
me the use of the notes in their books. At any rate, they
do not seem to have been overtaken by any dire retribu-
tion, for one of them is now a rich and prosperous lawyer
in Buffalo, and the other is a professor in your college and
the orator of to-day's celebration. The struggles with ten
lines of Virgil, which at first made up my daily task,
are amusing as remembered now; but with them I am also
forced to remember, that, instead of being the beginning
of the higher education for which I honestly longed,
they occurred near the end of my school advantages.
This suggests a disappointment which no lapse of time
can alleviate, and a deprivation I have sadly felt with
every passing year. . ..
   "I don't know that I should indulge further recollec-



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            HEREDITY AND ENV