The Indianapolis journal. [volume] (Indianapolis [Ind.]) 1867-1904, 1885-03-31
WALLACE AND COX.
Something About the Present Minister to
Turkey and His Successor.

Something About the Present Minister to
Turkey and His Successor.
''Gath's' New York Letter.
SO Mr.. Cox, after remarkably long congress
sional career, goes to Turkey, and this appoint
ment shows that the only portion of his nnmer-
Gus talents fully recognized is the literary part
He has been true to the love of travelling
and of learning. He wronged no man pursuing
those things Accompanied with most excel
lent wife, who is very cordial to know and who
has made him perfect companion, he has gone
to the Mediterranean, to Spain and to other
countries, and has not neglected his own, and
most of his books are pleasant and readable.
He succeeds at ConstantlnOple man whom
the politicians never much liked, nor the
military men either, but who, by using the
best that he had in the most selfrespecting
way, has almost made a definite mark on the
letters of his native land. General Wallace was,
| think, the SON of a prominent public man, per-
haps Governor of Indiana, and he married one
of family of interesting ssters about Crawfords-
vile, ladies who had been left by their parents
with respectable means, and whose good sense
was, generally speaking, equal to their other en-
dowments. Young Wallace went off to the Mex
lean war. and the family did not think much of
him until our own civil war began, when he fol-
lowed the bent of his principles as well as of his
adventure, and at Fort Donelson received repu-
taton and rank. He went to Mexico minis
ter, and there wrote a novel, which was consid-
cred by politicians OF ten and fifteen years
ago as rather the testimony to his weakness of
mind. The time is to come when all our poll
ticians will aspire to be authors. and they will
overdo things on that side. Wallace's book,
called 1.-THE Fair God was probably taken from
a suggestion in Prescott. After he went to
Turkey as our minister he wrote 'Ben Hur
which seems to have good sale, although 1T al
ways seems to me very hard book to read,
perhaps because the subject of it so high
and human nature so coarse. | took il up once
in the West at the request of a Democratic
politician, who thought very highly of it,
and l had read two or three chapters,
when I lost the book. Those chapters
seemed to me to be an attempt to
supply imagination to that portion of mankind
which has none of it. The three magi who come
from somewhere in the West to the cradle of
Christ, naturally furnish a subject for any
bodys mind which has the least wonder or fancy.
These mysterious strangers, who had come from
following star and stopped right at the spot of
the nativity invited all the painters and poets to
celebrate them. Their ideals have been put into
thousand pictures. Different towns in the
world have competed for being their birthplaces.
Minister Wallace assemblies them the desert
coming like needles to loadstone at the in
stinct of Chirst's birth. But he seemed to me to
rningle learning up with this instinct until large
portion of the romance of the wise men was
taken away Indeed it is not imagination to
explain wonders; it is imagination to make
wonders out or occurrences but consider
able number Of tho American people have got
to know General Wallace more from his book
than from his battles. Mr. Cox, replacing him
in Turkey, need have nothing whatever to do
except to beat Mr. Wallace's book. We commits
sion him to the Turks as a most agreeable little
man, who has had almost countless terms in
Congress, has talked always to the point, never
made much impression because he was never
earnest enough in any general line and now
if he fails to produce great literary work we
give him I'D.