The Life, Public Services and Select Speeches of Rutherford B. Hayes Part 22

But now see what this town is,--how it has grown. It has not increased to a first-cla.s.s city, but it has become a pleasant home, so pleasant, so thriving that I rejoice to think that whatever may be the result next fall it will be pleasant to return to it when the contest is over. If defeated, I shall return to you oftener than if I go to the White House. If I go there I shall look forward with pleasure to the time when I shall be permitted to return to you, to be a neighbor with you again. And really we have cause to be satisfied with our home and the interests which the future has in store for us here. Larger cities always have strife and rivalry, from which we are free, and yet we are well situated between two commercial centers, the Eastern and Western, between which is the great highway of the world, and we can not but partake of their prosperity. Over the railroad pa.s.sing through this place, or near it, will pa.s.s for all time to come the travel and trade of New York and San Francisco, of London and Pekin. Every town along this route partakes of the prosperity of this highway. Upper Sandusky, on the Pittsburgh, Fort Wayne and Chicago Railroad, and Tiffin, that thriving and beautiful city through which pa.s.ses the Baltimore and Ohio Railroad, south of us, while along the lake sh.o.r.e pa.s.ses the great northern division of the Lake Sh.o.r.e Road, making this route, as it were, the great artery of the world's travel, and we can abide with the prosperity that is to come in the future. Those of our friends who travel in Europe return sometimes dissatisfied, because there is a rawness in this country not seen in England and the older countries of Europe. But then the greatest happiness, as all of us know, in preparing a garden or a home is to see the improvements growing up under our hands. This is what we enjoy; and the change in Fremont from the time I first knew it till to-day gives me very great pleasure.

There is another change which gives rise to mournful reflections.

When I came here in the year 1834, I became acquainted with honored citizens who are no longer living. There was, Mr. Mayor, your father, Rudolphus d.i.c.kinson, Thomas I. Hawkins, Judge Olmsted, Judge Howland, and, among others, that marvel of business energy, George Grant; and I might go on giving name after name. But it is true that of all those I remember seeing on that first visit, not one is with us to-night. All who came with me, my uncle, my mother, and my sister, are gone. But this is the order of Providence.

Events follow upon one another as wave follows wave upon the ocean.

It is for each man to do what he can to make others happy. This is the prayer and this is the duty of life. Let us, my friends, in every position, undertake to perform this duty. For one, I have no reliance except that which Abraham Lincoln had when, on leaving Springfield, he said to his friends: "I go to Was.h.i.+ngton to a.s.sume a responsibility greater than that which has been devolved upon any one since the first president, and I beg you, my friends and neighbors, to pray that I may have that Divine a.s.sistance, without which I can not succeed, and with which I can not fail." In that spirit I ask you to deal with me. If it shall be the will of the people that this nomination shall be ratified, I know I shall have your good wishes and your prayers. If, on the other hand, it shall be the will of the people that another shall a.s.sume these great responsibilities, let us see to it that we who shall oppose him give him a fair trial.

My friends, I thank you for the interest you have taken in this reception, and that you have laid aside partisan feeling. There has been too much bitterness on such occasions in our land. Let us see to it that abuse and vituperation of the candidate that shall be named at St. Louis do not proceed from our lips. Let us, in this centennial year, as we enter upon this second century of our existence, set an example of what a free and intelligent people can do. There is gathered at Philadelphia an a.s.semblage representing nearly all the Nations of the world, with their arts and manufactures. We have invited compet.i.tion, and they have come to compete with us, and with each other. We find that America stands well with the works of the world, as there exhibited. Let us show, in electing a chief magistrate of the Nation--the officer that is to be the first of forty or forty-five millions--let us show all those who visit us how the American people can conduct themselves through a canva.s.s of this kind. If it shall be in the spirit in which we have met to-night, if it shall be that justness and fairness shall be in all the discussions, it will commend free inst.i.tutions to the world in a way which they have never been commended before.

Well, friends, I am detaining you too long. Therefore I close what I have to say by expressing the feelings of grat.i.tude entertained by myself and family for the kindness and regard shown us by the people of Fremont.

About the middle of the war, General Sherman lost a boy, named after himself, aged about thirteen years. He supposed that he belonged to the Thirteenth Infantry, and when they went out to drill and dress parade, he dressed in the dress of a sergeant and marched with them. But he sickened and died. The regiment gathered about him, for he was to them a comrade--dear as the child is loved by men who are torn away from the a.s.sociations of home. General Sherman, the great soldier, was touched by it. He said it would be idle for him to try to express the grat.i.tude which he felt; but he said they held the key to the affections of himself and family, and if any of them should ever be in need, if they would mention that they belonged to the Thirteenth Infantry at the time his boy died, they would divide with him the last blanket, and last morsel of food. It is in this spirit that I wish to express my thanks to the people of Fremont for the welcome they have given me. I bid you, my friends, good night.