one hundred and fifty millions in gold, which fund shall be used for such redemption purposes only." If that fund should fall below one hundred millions it should be the duty of the Secretary of the Treasury to replenish it to the maximum sum of one hundred and fifty millions. by the sale of three per cent bonds, of which the interest and principal should be payable in gold. The proceeds of these bonds should not "be used to meet deficiencies in the current revenues." United States notes, when redeemed and reissued, should be held "in the reserve fund until exchanged for gold." The legal tender quality of the silver dollar was unaffected.1 During the summer of 1900 affairs in China claimed the attention of the State Department, and Hay as its head directed the admirable course of the United States, showing great ability in state-craft. 2 John Hay, as he gave an account of himself, "was born in Indiana, grew up in Illinois, was educated in Rhode Island. I learned my law," he continued, "in Springfield and my politics in Washington, my diplomacy in Europe, Asia and Africa." He had an innate sense of refinement but his cultivated manner never obscured his Western raciness. He loved society and talk. Residing ten years in Cleveland, he organized a dinner club, called the Vampire, of which he was the life. Hay used to come to the dinners primed with circumstances and anecdotes and, eating and drinking little, he gave himself up to talk and was listened to with interest and delight. Not infrequently one of the wits of the club 1 U. S. Statutes, xxxi. 45. would prod Hay and, with his rare sense of humor a witticism of the sort served for an additional display. Occasionally he would fall into a serious strain and talk of political events or his acquaintances in New York or England, but always replete with intelligence. Sometimes, although with seeming reluctance, he would speak of his work on Lincoln, on which he was then engaged, and the business men, who gathered at that round table, were eager to hear of the processes of a live author. But it was a common remark that he never repeated himself. "What things have we seen Done at the Mermaid [Union Club of Cleveland] heard words that have been So nimble and so full of subtile flame." "There is no longer the play of wit and raillery," wrote Professor Matthews, "the brilliancy, the concentration, the rapid glancing at a hundred subjects in succession, which there used to be in the attic nights of Johnson, Burke, Garrick and Sheridan." But had the Professor dined with the Vampire, when Hay was at his best, he might have thought it an attic night. Hay was the soul of the club and when in 1879 he felt compelled to accept the position of Assistant Secretary of State, offered him by William M. Evarts, he left a void, which, although the dinners went on, was not filled until his return to Cleveland, when he was welcomed with glee. Hay was not a trained historian in the way of knowing thoroughly the masters of the art. He did not read with rapt attention Gibbon, Macaulay, Parkman or any other 1 The Great Conversers (1874), 42. historian except Henry Adams. He was apt to have at hand some high class French novel or Memoirs. He was especially fond of Tourguéneff. Is there in literature, he asked, such another story of a suicide so dramatically told, as that of Nejdanof in Terres Viorges? During a long acquaintance I never heard him talk of historians except of his friend Henry Adams, but he had at his tongue's end what we used to call belles-lettres and his conversation thereon was a profit and delight. In his familiar letters written to his coadjutor Nicolay in regard to the History, when he spoke of condensation or the troubles of narration, there is never a question how Macaulay or Parkman would have treated the one or solved the other. We "must seize every chance to condense," he wrote. "We could cut down a good deal and present what would be a continuous narrative in about half the space we have taken for our book." Unquestionably had he followed out this idea, the History would have been more popular and less criticized. Although Hay did not possess the power of generalization of Gibbon he had two qualities invaluable for a historian that of narration and a skepticism that influenced in a marked degree his judgment of men and of events. And no writers in America ever had more priceless material. As private secretaries of Lincoln, feeling that he was the central figure of the time, thinking that some day they might write a history of these eventful years, they made memoranda and garnered up their impressions. Robert T. Lincoln, the President's son, had a large body of material which he placed at their dis 1 Thayer, ii. 28, 35. |