The Portland daily press., 1899-01-31
eARLANo's CAREER.
some Odd Features OF the Arkansas
ststesman's Life.
(Boston Transcript.)

ditions surrounding the death OF ex.At.
tornsy General Garland have not oarri cd
the shock 20 his friends here which would
have been experienced n they had not
seemed like the elimination Of a series
of misfortunes which pursued him from
/ the time he left the Senate. They began
with the Pan Electric Telephone scandal
within a few months of his entry into
the first Cleveland cabinet, and followed
each other relentlessly TIL the painful
death OF cherished daughter in fit OF
religious depression. For several years
Mr.. Garland mad appeared a solitary
man, badly broken in spirit. No one
who knew him well believed that he was
in any way corrupt In his connection with
the telephone case, but rather that he had
gone in good faith into speculative enter
prise. illustrating afresh the familiar
principle that those who are trained and
employed to protect the property of 9TH
ers are often most ill-htted to take care
of their own or to steer clear of unfortu.
nate business entanglements. Mr.. Gar
lands death has recalled TO many minds
! incidents of his long career In Washing
ton, some of them humorous and some
pathetic. The story of the trick played
on him in the Senate by n group of COL
leagues who offered him cubes of brown
windsor soap under the pretence that they
were carsmels, and were dismayed 10 see
him eat them with apparent relish, has
been told too many times TO bear repeat
ing. But thsre is a less hackneyed rem
iniscence OF his return to Washington
after the campaign of 1860, a convert to
teetotalism. He had always been mp to
glasses with his brother Senators with
no restraint beyond his own distaste for
excuses When he suddenly declined the
preferred hospitality Of their sideboards
they were astonished and asked him a
thousand auctions to draw out the rea-
son. He consented at last to explain.
Il Gentlemen said he. II have simply
stopped. We had pretty hot canvass In
/ Arkansas this summer, aud l stumped
most of the State. i saw everywhere the
graves of good fellows who used to share
my convivialities, while others, reduced
to sorry wrecks, were still moving about
the streets. Figuring the thing up rough
ly, and dividing the total of the whiskey
consumed in A rkansas by the number OF
habitual consumers SO as to get an aver
age. found that l had already drunk
about n barrel and "a half OF whiskey more
than l was entitled 10. This set me TO
thinking: If l drink any more, said
to myself, Il shall be drinking some other
fellows whiskey.' OF course l didn' t
want to do that, SO I just stopped. >
MIR. Garland as cabinet officer. never
changed his mode of life in the least from
x~ha il ba1 "a lived
in "a quiet neigh borhood. in IA little de-
tached frame house, very much such Il
one as be might have built on his estate
at Hominy Hin, as u homo for bis old
age His contempt for claw-hammer
coats prevented his taking part in any OF
the great social functions, but his moth
er, Mrs. Hubbard, kept house for him
and thoroughly enjoyed the weekly visit
ing which Is "a part of the round OF IL cab
met family's activities. She was sociahle
in her tastes. but In homely and urpre-
tentious way TO which she had always
been used, and she rarely referred to her
son except MS my baby" because, as she
OK planned, he was her youngest child and
4 had been reared by her alone, after his
fathers death. Hominy Hill was an estate
of some 1900 acres not very far from
! Little Rock, and so primitive as to i'm
provements that the owner found 1t nee.
esssry to furn ish pencilled diagram Of
its labyrinthine roads to any friend
whom he invited out to see him for the
first time. 1t had or IL long, double.
faced loghouse built on the two-pens-
and AN ALLEY model, the open space be-
tween the two solid structures being used
as dining room in fair weather, for the
place was rarely renanted except in the
warmer months. Back of the house were
several springs, one of which much re-
sam bled the White Sulphur Springs 50
famous in Virginia. In the Fourche nv
or, near by, there was good fishing, and
in the brush it was not uncommon to Ind
! wild deer. l Ia interesting as a CONNER
tary on the political changes wrought in
this country by the passage of genera
ton, that before the Civil war Garland
was o Wing and Unionlst, that during
the war he was Confederate oihceaold-
| err and after 1t fought u successful battle
against test-oath determinations and be-
came u member of the 1irst Democratic
| cabinet; but that he lived to see his son
come out on the Republican side in the
campaign of 1895. Young MIR. Garlnnd
took this means of emphasizing his hor-
ror of the assault made by the Democrat
/ 10 National convention upon popular rev.
ereuce for law and order. The ex-attor'
! ney general took much pride In the yarie
gated features of his own career. lie
was recsntly counsel for an offender
against the postal laws who appealed To
executive clemency. Il want TO see
President Mckinley in person, said MIR.
Garland, and talk with him about this
matter, for l ain somewhat of an author
ity on pardons. As governor of Arkan'
sas, / considered all applications and
granted several; as attorney general q
| the United States | passed upon many
other cases; and TO cap all | received d
pardon from President johnson for an
offence which would have been. If the
prosecution had been vigorous enough,
punishable by DEATH"
LINCOLN.