New-York tribune., 1921-03-20

! luton in our national administration
| will be certainly and fully attained.v
This is more than youthful fervo,
in behalf Of hero. It il able politica,
reasoning, calm, hard hitting, per.
suasive. At twenty-thre q cub editor
running country weekly on shoe.
string, Reid could not only see the new
man upon the horizon, but could plead
for him like seasoned veteran. Look.
ing back to The Xenia News and its
young proprietor, with later per.
| spective of the surrounding events. II
is not hard to see that rare politician
and rare journalist were ready to
hand, waiting upon OPPORTUNITY.
|0PPoRTUNITY came in the Civil
War. Like his country, he was
plunged into battle before he could
realize'what had happened. He served as
war correspondent for The Cincinnati
Gazette, first in West Virginia, later
where the battle was hottest, with
Shiloh and Gettysburg as the~high
marks of his reporting. The dispatches
make moving reading even to-day.
Printed over the pen name of sAgate"
they won speedy fame. They were
orderly and accurate. They were vividly
descriptive in the spectacular moments.
And they were outspokenly candid,
with praise or blame. In 1872, when
Edmund Clarence Stedman was col
lecting material for poem upon Get
tysburg, his wide reading led him to
rate Reid's dispatches as "the best
group of battle letters made up dur
ing the war. without exception" Let
one short quotation represent the
whole Of these articles written with
the smell of fire upon them:
"Some Massachusetts batteries
Captain Bigelow's, Captain Phillips's,
two or three more under Captain Nc
Gilvry, of Maine-were planted on
the extreme left, advanced now we'll
down the Emmitsburg Road, with in
| fantry in their front-the first d.
vision, | think, of Sickles's Corps. A
little after 5 Con July q a fierce
rebel charge drove back the infan-
try and menaced the batteries. Or
ders are sent to Bigelow, on the ex-
treme left, to hold his position at
every hazard short of sheer annihila-
tion, till a couple more batteries can
be brought to his support. Reserving
his fire little, then with depressed
| guns opening with double charges of
| grape and canister, he smites and
skaters, but cannot break, the adj
vancing line. His grape and CAMS
ter arc exhausted, and still closing
grandly up over their slain, ON they
come. He falls back on spherical
case and pours this in at the shortest
range. On, still onward, comes the
artillery -defying line, and still he
holds his position. They are within
six PAGES of the guns-he fires again.
Once more, and he blows devoted SOL
diers from his very muzzles. And still
mindful of that solemn order he holds
his place. They spring upon his car
riages and shoot down his horses.
And then, his Yankee artllerists still
about him, he seizes the guns by
hand and from the very front of that
line drags two Of them off. The
caissons are further back-fve out of
| the six are saved
"That single company in that half
| ko1Y,c G~1+ 1rct th;rty broo of ;%c
men, including every sergeant it had
! The captain himself was wounded.
| Yet it was the first time it was ever
under fire! give it simply as a type.
| So they fought along that fiery line!"
All the chapters relating to the war
hold the eye. Mr.. Cortissoz succeeds
| in giving not only his young Journalist
| in action, but also that tense, tragic
background against which all America
lived and fought. They form rich
and poignant narrative worth any one s
reading, regardless of historic value
One more quotation from the period
close succeeding is worth reproduc-
tion to show the range of this rising
reporter. He is writing Of the i'm
peachment proceedings of '68 and de-
scribing the leading speaker in Presi-
dent Johnson's behalf:
"Figure to yourselves slender,
nervous, hollow-chested person of
about the medium height, straight as
an arrow, with what is called long
head [narrow from ear to ear, but
swelling nobly above the temples),
covered with short black hair, with
pinched, parchment-skinn face,
that always reminds one Of the pic
lures and descriptions of the opium
eater. De Quincy. The nose is long
and hooked, and the chin projects, as
if half-minded to meet it. This is
Evarts as he stands up at the coun-
sells table to address the Senate for
man whom personally he detested.
but whose defense he believes to be
legitimate.
Ellis voice is more remarkable than
his appearance. 1t seems to be
| shrill tenor, of very little volume,
| but it is wonderfully we'll managed.
The enunciation is simply perfect;
| and so this thin-voiced, narrow
chested speaker, rarely rising above
| conversational tones, is heard with