Sacramento daily record-union. [volume] (Sacramento [Calif.]) 1875-1891, 1880-11-29
TIE FATE OF THE rowPATH CLUB.

The fate which befell the Washington
Towpath Club will we hope be warning
to political aspirants of an unsophisticated
kind for some time to come. This club
failed to realize the distinction between
campaign romance and stern reality. Hav-
ing gone through the Presidential canvass
with the customary enthusiasm, the Tow.
path Club thought it would be an appro-
pirate finale to pay visit to General
Garfield and delicately call his attention
to the immense services it had rendered,
and to the cheerful willingness of each
and all its members to take public
office. This brilliant scheme was &C.
cordingly carried out. We are not
informed whether the club went
to the house of the President elect in
their uniforms, and with canal-boat in
tow, but it is stated that they had cards
printed on which the positions of the
members were duly indicated by the
phrases First Deckhand," "Second
Deckhand," and SO forth. So equipped
they called upon General Garfeld-and
were forthwith snubbed in the iciest
manner. The report says "the reception
he gave the party was absolutely glacial.
He curtly nodded to them, standing,
"and not asking them to sit down. One
of the spokesman feebly said that he
was glad to see that the Garfield
canal-boat was finally entering its
" last lock, when Garfield shut him off
with such stern look that the
speaker choked in the middle of the SEN
teDce, and almost strangled. Gradually
it began to dawn Upon the callers that
they were not pleasant company, and
they crept silently away, hoping, as
they went, that they had not intruded. )"
General Garfield is reported as having
subsequently, remarked to friend that
"he had no patience with such idiocy. He
asnot ashamed of having been a canal
boy, neither was it matter of Boosting.
1t was mere incident in his life.
"and not of the least Importance
sin shaping his after career" This
Is view which of course had never
occurred to the Towpath Club. They
imagined that if there was anything in his
past life of which General Garfield was
prouder than another it must be the cir
oumstance that he had once driven mules
on towpath. In the heat Of a Presiden-
tial campaign the most absurd things often
become the focus Of Fictitious enthusiasm.
The log-cabin, the hard cider, the rail-split.
ting, the canal-boat, the thousand and one
trivialities which serve to excite attention
and interest for the moment, and which
sometimes enlist the sympathies of lower
intelligences by fattering them with the
fsllacious idea that they ars after all not
really inferior to the higher intelligences,
have their hour. But when the cam.
paign is over and the object of it has
been accomplished, these accessories are
as obsolete as the flowers of rhetoric and
the drafts upon the Imagination with
which partisan orators endeayor to kindle
the enthusiasm of the masses at such
periods. This the Washington Towpath
Club failed to comprehend, and the
consequence was that they made fools of
themselves. No doubt their absurd course
was embarrassing to General Garfield, but
it is to his credit that he could not bring
himselfIto join in tie imbecilities of the CO.
casion as some men in his position would
have done. He was Disguised and annoyed,
and he showed it. The Towpath Club at
least had sense enough to perceive that it
had bluniered, and retired in confusion.
Another time its members will understand
that campaign fooleries ought to be laid
aside when the campaign is ended.