The National tribune., 1889-01-31
EARNrNG a prNsIoN.


went to the front during the war and helped
to save the country earned a pension, and
that the least that the rescued and prosper
Gus Nation can in decency offer him is So
month, with a proportionate increase for
long service or disability.
He earned at least IS month by the mere
act Of forsaking home, business family and
opportunities for making money, and offer
ing himself as a target for the shafts Of dis
ease and the bullets of the enemy.
1t cost every man very much to do this,
and the best demonstration of it was the
great reluctance of the vast number of men
who did not 60 TO make this sacrifice and
incur these dangers. Much as they may now
talk about big bounties and high pay and
little danger, there was no bounty big enough
in 1875 to tempt them from the sweet
security Of their fresides even for three
months. They were willing to do anything
rather than don the blue and accept all that
themselves on their strength and manhood
swarmed around the Examining Surgeons,
alleging disabilities that their most intimate
friends had never suspected, in order to get
excused from the drafts. Themultitudinous
disabilities which were developed by the
draft law were startling to the believers in
the American physique. Men who could
see a modest dime blocks away, suddenly
became unable to read the letters on a circus
poster. Men who could hunt, or fish, or plOw
for weeks at a time without inconvenience,
all at once became so susceptible to the
weather that the near approach of Summer
shower would double them up with rheuma-
tism. Men who had been party-leaders, even
oficeholders, quickly discovered that they
were still subjects of European Govern
ments, and flockcd around the Consular
Offices for protection certificates" The
Consuls in all the large cities reaped quite
/ handsome harvest in fees from this class of
service to "naturalized citizens" Thousands
of men who could not avail themselves of
any Of these methods of escaping the draft,
betook themselves to the friendly shores of
Canada, or the far-off Territories to avoid the
Enrolling Officers. Canada, particularly,
reveled in an influx of cheap leabor. Draft
refugees worked for as low as 10 cents
day and their board in the Canadian lumber
/ ing camps and elsewhere.
In 1861-65 no one talked lightly or dis
paragingly about enlisting. They could
not very well, with every train that came
from the South bringing back manned and
disease-wasted men, with every days papers
telling of slaughtered thousands, with sad
CARRIED mourners constantly going about the
streets. and homes robbed of their frst-born
confronting them on every hand.
1t required the highest order of courage
and self-sacrifce oput on the blue then. Not
only the instinct of safety and the love of
comfort strongi in all men-but the desire for
money-equally strong in most men-held
them back. Never was money made so easily
and rapidly as it was By those who staid at
home from 1851 TO 1865. The man who felt
that his country called him had all this to
contend with. At home was peace, comfort,
the society Of his friends and loved ones, and
4 plenty of money within easy reach. In the
field were hardships, dangers, priyations,
perils, disease, death and poverty.
Nothing but the purest patriotism could
make him forsake the one and choose the
other. 1.-The did so, the country viii make
very insufficient return to him, indeed, if it
gives him for the rest of his life as much of
a pension as it gave for vastly less reason to
those who took part in the wars with Mexico
and Great Britain.