The Indianapolis journal. [volume] (Indianapolis [Ind.]) 1867-1904, 1902-09-09
SHACHLETT
w. COPYRIGHT 1901 BIZ D. APPLETON q Co.
| RIGHTS RESERVED.

the Confession of Faith? OF course, there
are such here. but they're missionary So
ciety women that 1 don't meet; and If 1
did they'd talk about religion when l want
to talk about the practical relation between
such things as your church's Confession OF
| Faith and the laws men have made and are
| now enforcing by government L am sorry
| that the public life of your husband is like
| ly to keep you from your studies more
| than you expected. perhaps, but 1 hope
| may be allowed to come up occasionally 10
| sharpen my own wits at your fireside.'
| Mrs. Shacklett herself had misgivings
| about living up to her own standard Of help
| to her husband. but Shacklett, who was
| keeping one eye on her with something of
wonder and all of admiration assured her
| that nobody could do better, and that if he
| had married her seven or eight years sooner
| he might have been President by this time.
| She felt the need Of something for COM
parison and for this reason was anxious
| TO go to Washington to study the wives of
the public men there. Shacklett said that
it a good thing she had not made this
study. for her original methods were far
superior to the somewhat hackneyed ones
| at Washington, which have been worked
1
they are fast losing force from intimate
acquaintanceship with them by the masses.
After the break in the current of her life
caused by the rocks projecting at the point
where she selected the house in Washing
| ton, engaged the servants, bought the fur
nishings and planned the new home. all of
which took nearly month of hurried
work. Mrs. Shacklett took stock of herself,
| 1T is all SO different" she said to him,
but don't see that it is either better or
worse than the old habits 1 had. 1 think
| l have enjoyed It, because 1t has supplied
| something 1 never had before that seems
part of the nature of womankind. L always
was a quiet, studious girl, concerned more
about the solid realities of things than
about the frothier pleasures that come into
| life to make it happier. A generation be-
| fore would have been called blue-stock-
ing, and the French salons of hundred
| years ago always seemed to me the best
things the world has ever seen. l never
| had the spirit of other girls that make
them enjoy the admiration of men-a spirit
| that / suppose Is instructive in all normal
femininity. The fact is, 1 did not know
many men, and the idea of being charming
| was one 1 never thought of.
This was not right because it was not
normal, and I'm getting now what missed
| at the usual age L enjoy it just as much,
| because am trying TO make men charmed
| with you, as if 1 were doing it for myself
| perhaps more so. L have been thinking
about the deceits and lack of candor in
| volved in 1t all. but I don't see any more
| wrong in what I've been doing than there
| is in the little concealments and tactful arts
| of the young girl in bevy of young men.
1 was afraid that politics, even up here
| where we are, was full of really wicked i'm
! trigue, but 1 do not find that or, at least,
1 can smile at the crudeness of the intrigue
| which always fails its purpose and thus
proves it's undesirability from any view
| point. Noel, I'm thousand times happier
| than ever dreamed of being, and the most
| of it comes to me from trying to give it
| to you
man like Shacklett, trained to secrecy
| as the cornerstone of most success, could
no more tell anybody everything than an
| old doctor could be gossip or a successful
| financier be loquacious. He told his wife
| so much that he seemed to make her his
| general manager, and he failed to tell her
| so much that she knew no more about the
| engine running the hidden machinery FORM
| ing political loaves of bread and shaping
| destines of men than the reader of the
newspaper does.
For instance, two years after their first
and only victory the reform forces in their
| home city were routed, horse, foot and
! dragons. and she could hardly understand
| why. Shacklett said that he could not af-
| ford to NEEDLE In city election, now that
| his duties lay all over the State with its
| diversified interests, and she could appre-
| ciate that. But she grieved a little that
| the good people might have won If her hus-
| band had given them the aid which he gave
| in the first instance-for this was what
Colonel Baker told her, and he talked to
her with much frankness and true friend
| illness, as became man who had known
her people in Illinois, and had been a stanch
and warm supporter of Shacklett in the
| State which had adopted all three of them.
| Colonel Baker used to entertain her with
| accounts of fights over appointments about
which her husband said little, and she no.
| ticed that Shacklett smiled as If really
| amused when she recounted these stories
to him in the evening. Somehow Shacklett
did not take Colonel Baker very seriously
to his wife, although he gave the colonel
all the respect and plums political that go
| to favorites. Sometimes she felt that
Shacklett did not really like Colonel Baker
| very well, but she could not help liking him
on account of his continual deferential way
| of advising her, which she found saved her
many petty annoyances.
In the stampede which trampled the re-
form forces at home into the ground an
opposition congressman managed to be car
ried past the winning goal in the district
of the capital city and Shacklett's home
This gave the senator all the federal pa
tronage of that district even to minor Of
fees, and greatly increased his worries His
wife tried hard to ease his shoulders of
part of this new burden, but he told her
that the recommendations and delegations
for candidates always came to Washington
In a hurry, so that he could not bring
many of them to the house, and he did not
like to think of them any more than was
necessary The pestiferous swarm of Office
seekers did not decrease after two years
more had elapsed, for the opposition men,
Der of the House made such good use of
his own opportunities-listed from the