The Pacific commercial advertiser. [volume] (Honolulu, Hawaiian Islands) 1885-1921, 1909-04-25

who enjoyed long intimate acqnaIn-
lance with the ex-President, has gath
tbered some "reminiscences from his rec
ords for publication. He comments
upon Mr.. Cleveland S humor, sympa-
| thy, and simple friendliness, and on
| his aversion to needless conversation.
| Mr.. Williams found him, however, a
most inspiring listener, with fiat
tering manner of regarding you while
talking, as if your views upon the topic
of conversation were quite as worthy
of attention as his own
| AS an illustration of this Characters
tic trait. Mr.. Williams sketches the fol-
lowing dramatic incident in The Amer
| lean Magazine:
| On the afternoon that President Nc
| KinIey was shot at Buffalo, Mr.. Cleve-
| land was fishing with friend in
| small lake in the Berkshires. At about
| sunset man was seen rowing rapidly
out toward the ex-President S boat.
"Mr Cleveland, Mr.. Cleveland he
shouted as he drew within call, "Presi-
dent Mckinley has been assassinated. J"
The ex-President did not start. He
simply looked at the stranger, too much
amazed by this bolt out of the blue
to say anything.
The man came nearer. 81 tell you,
he repeated, painting from his rapid
rowing, president Mckinley has been
5hot-killed!
Mr. Cleveland scrutinized the stranger
moment in grave silence, betraying
| nothing of what he thought or felt
| Then making a sign to show that he
had heard and appreciated what the,
man wished to say, his gaze dropt to
his line again. though of course he was
not thinking of fishing now.
The bearer of bad tidings looked at
the apparently stoIid figure of the
silent fisherman. "You don t seem to
be much excited about it, he NUT
| tered, and, putting about, rowed slowly
to shore.
Mr.. Cleveland waited a little while,
still in profound silence, then thought
fully Keeling in his line he merely said
TO his frienu, ''Well, [ guess we may
as we'll 90. On the way to shore he
disiointed his rod in his careful, delib-
crate manner, put it in the case, saying
northing.
At the landing he was met by the
nearest local correspondent for GER
tain New-York newspaper, also quite
excited and not little embarrassed
by his unwelcome assignment :" IN
sorry to trouble you, SIR he said,
/" but my paper wants me to get two
hundred words from you on the as
sassination of the President
Mr.. Cleveland at first shook his
head. Say this he finally answered,
that in common with all decent, pa
trotic American citizens l am so hor-
rified by this report that I am unable
to say anything Then turning
hastily away he drove off with his
friend, and for some time said nothing
even to him as the carriage jolted
over the billy roads and the sunset
faded. Then suddenly, as if they had
been talking all the time, he said
aloud well. it may not be true"
Presently he added, "It may be true
that he has been shot, it may not be
true that he has been killed" After
that there was still longer silence
until finally just before the end of the
drive--it was now quite dark-he
began to talk (and note the extraordi-
nary prescience of the conclusion he
reached as a result of his slow, silent
brooding upon the momentous It'd
ings): First of all, he said, if the re-
port were true, the thing could hardly
have been done by disappointed Of
flee. seeker as in the case of poor Gar
field,' for the circumstances at the
time were not such as to make that
no nj ha nIain
it very likely that labor troubles could
have been the immediate cause; there
We're no strikes of Importance on at
the time. Other possible agencies were
passed in review and cast aside as
possible but hardly probable. So he
added quietly, but with the divination
of seer of old, "if Mckinley has been
shot there is no other explanation than
that it has been by the hand of some
foreign anarchist And within few
| hours he was reliably informed that
this precisely was the case!
Mr.. Cieveland's early recognition of
Mr.. Roosavelt's political ability also
emphasizes another phase of his alert
analytical mind. Mr.. George F. Par
ker, his official biographer, gives the
following incident in McClures Maya
zine for April. Mr.. Cleveland said to
Mr.. Parker Immediately after the ac-
cession of Mr.. Roosevelt to the presi-
dency:
Roosevelt is the most perfectly
equipped and the most effective poll
tician thus far seen in the presidency
Jackson, Jefferson and Van Buren,
We're not, for a moment, comparable
with him in this respect. When I was
Governor he was still a very young
man and only a member of the Assem-
bly,: but it was clear to me, even thus
early, that he was looking to public
career: that he was studying political
conditions with care that I had
never known any man to show: and
that he was firmly convinced that he
would some day reach prominence. I
| must, however, confess that I never
supposed that the presidency would
come within the scope of his aspira-
tions so early in life
The writer adds:
In October, 1907. in the course of
conversation. I told this anecdote to
Mr.. Richard Olney, in Boston, and
he exclaimed:
''Oh. can beat that! I know of an
occasion when Mr.. Cleveland express