Savannah morning news. [volume] (Savannah) 1868-1887, 1881-04-26
THE LATE GEN. JOSEPH LANE.
A Talk OF the Old Democratic War
Horse of the Northwest In His Re
TRACY.

The following, from an interview with
Mr.. Brown, of Oregon. during the St.
Louis Convention in June, 1875, in view
of the recent death of General Lane. will
be read with interest:
But the most notable object of inter
est we have in our Western regions, !"
continued Brown, of Oregon, his eve
cleaning with devotional fire, sis old
Gen. Joe Lane. l suppose there are
thousands of people in this country fa-
miliar with his name and record, who
would swear he was dead, and the young
politicians of the present generation
manage to get along without mentioning
him at all, which is very remarkable, |
sometimes think, considering what con-
spicuous figure he was in American poll
tlcs twenty years ago. Indiana idol
lied him. No man ever received
such an ovation for services in the
field as Joe Lane when he returned from
Mexico, at the close of the war, and gave
the State chance to carry him on its
shoulders for his gallantry at Buena
Vista. He came West in 1855. was ap-
pointed Provisional Governor of Oregon
by Fillmore, then was in the Senate.
and had just finished his term when
the Charleston Convention recognized
his Radical pro slavery opinions by
placing him on the ticket with Breckin-
ridge. After the defeat he came back to
us in disgust, and the hot political places
that once knew him will know him no
more forever. He bought farm back of
Roseburg, running up from the Valley of
the Willamette, and built him a small
frame house high up on a picturesque
spur of the Rogue River Mountains,
where he has lived ever since in the
most perfect seclusion. Two years
ago he lost his wife, whom he
always called ''the Madam" and
loved devotedly. Since then his desola-
ton has been relieved only by negro
boy, who cooks and keeps house for him.
He is eighty-three now, straight as an ar
row, six feet two in height, and he can
pick up his rifle and bring home deer,
or follow down trout stream over the
rocks about as well as the next man.
And then he reads great deal. One
room IN his cabin is sacred to his
books, and his library is one of the
most valuable on the Pacafic Slope
Strange how the old man hangs on to
the skirts of the past Old thoughts,
old questions, old scenes, old statesmen
which have nearly faded out of our
remembrance and given place to the issues
and plans of the present, are meat,
drink and lodging to him. The new
thoughts of an ever busy and progressive
race he cares very little about compare
lively, and seems to have made up his
mind that the country is retrograding.
q fa1lyc ah
Cal honor and integrity, and any com.
parIson with the present turns him sick
at the stomach. Only once lately we
got him worked up to the point of com
ing down from his garret in the clouds
and making speech. 1t was on the
4th of June, at Roseburg, just as we
were getting ready to leave for st. Louis.
We circulated it in every direction, and
people came over the mountains to hear
him, taking three and four days for the
journey. There were at least five thou
sand there, and when the old hero began
the auditors stretched their necks as if
some revelation was coming, and every
word was to be precious. Only a few
could hear him, for his voice has drifted
into the childish treble, but curiosity
kept them spell-bound till he
closed. He reminded one, with his
majestic presence and flowing white
beard, of some John the Baptist, in the
wilderness, crying unto the people,
Repent! And when he came down
from the platform he took us delegates
to one side, and begged us, with falter-
ing voice and tears in his eyes, to give
the country pure ticket, and help
bring back the honesty and deeancv
which politics had lost and the country
wanted to see restored. The boys'-for
that's the name he calls us by-look up
to him with great veneration, and think
there is still more eloquence in those
weak, trembling tones than in all mod
ern orators combined"