January 16th, continued. Ⓐapparatus note About General Sickles. Ⓐapparatus note

With considerable frequency, since then, I have tried to get publishers to make the experiment of such a magazine, but I was never successful. I was never able to convince a publisherⒶapparatus note that The Back NumberⒶapparatus note would interest the public. Not one of them was able to conceive of the idea of a sane human being finding interest in stale things. I made my latest effort three years agoⒺexplanatory note. Again I failed to convince. But I, myself, am not convinced. I am quite sure that The Back NumberⒶapparatus note would succeed and become a favorite. I am also sure of another thing—that The Back NumberⒶapparatus note would have this advantage over any other magazine that was ever issued, to wit: that the man who read the first paragraph in it would go on and read the magazine entirely through, skipping nothing—whereas there is no magazine in existence which ever contains three articles which can be depended upon to interest the reader. It is necessary to put a dozenⒶapparatus note articles into a magazine of the day in order to hit six or eight tastes. One man buys the magazine for one of its articles, another is attracted by another,Ⓐapparatus note another by a third; but no man buys the magazine because of the whole of its contents. I contend that The Back NumberⒶapparatus note would be bought for the whole of its contents, and that each reader would read the whole.Ⓐapparatus note

“Mr. Paine, you and I will start that magazine, and try the experiment, if you are willing to select the ancient news from old books and newspapers, and do the rest of the editorial work. Are you willing?”

Mr. Paine. “I should be very willing, when we get so that we can undertake it.”

“Very well, then we will, by and by, make that experiment.”

TwichellⒶapparatus note and I stepped across the street, that night, in the rain, and spent an hour with General Sickles. Sickles is eighty-one years old, now. I had met him only once or twice before, although there has been only the width of 9th streetⒶapparatus note between us for a year. He is too old to make visits, and I am too lazy. I remember when he killed PhilipⒶapparatus note Barton Key, son of the author of “The Star-Spangled Banner,” and I remember the prodigious excitement it made in the country. I think it cannot be far from fifty years ago. My vague recollection of it is that it happened in Washington, and that I was there at the timeⒺexplanatory note.

I have felt well acquainted with GeneralⒶapparatus note Sickles for thirty-eight or thirty-nine years, because I have known TwichellⒶapparatus note that long. TwichellⒶapparatus note was a chaplain in Sickles’s brigade in the Civil WarⒺexplanatory note, and he was always fond of talking about the General. TwichellⒶapparatus note was under Sickles all through the war. Whenever he comes down from Hartford he makes it his duty to go and pay his respects [begin page 288] to the General. Sickles is a genial old fellowⒶapparatus note; a handsome and statelyⒶapparatus note military figure; talks smoothly,Ⓐapparatus note in well-constructed English—I may say perfectly constructed English. His talk is full of interest and bristling with points, but as there are no emphases scattered through it anywhere, and as there is no animation in it, it soon becomes oppressive by its monotony, and it makes the listener drowsy. TwichellⒶapparatus note had to step on my foot once or twice. The late Bill Nye once said “I have been toldⒶapparatus note that Wagner’s music is better than it soundsⒺexplanatory note.” That felicitous description of a something which so many people have tried to describe, and couldn’t, does seem to fit the General’s manner of speech exactly. His talk is much better than it is. No, that is not the idea—there seems to be a lack there somewhere. Maybe it is another case of the sort just quoted. Maybe Nye would say that “itⒶapparatus note is better than it sounds.” I think that is it. His talk does not sound entertaining, but it is distinctly entertaining.

Sickles lost a leg at Gettysburg, and I remember Twichell’sⒶapparatus note account of that circumstance. He talked about it on one of our long walks, a great many years ago, and although the details have passed out of my memory, I still carry the picture in my mind as presented by TwichellⒶapparatus note. The leg was carried off by a cannon ballⒶapparatus note. TwichellⒶapparatus note, and others, carried the General out of the battle, and they placed him on a bed made of boughs,Ⓐapparatus note under a tree. There was no surgeon present, and TwichellⒶapparatus note and Rev. Father O’HaganⒶapparatus note, a Catholic priest, made a make-shift tourniquet and stopped the gush of blood— checkedⒶapparatus note it, perhaps is the right term. A newspaper correspondent appeared first. GeneralⒶapparatus note Sickles considered himselfⒶapparatus note a dying man, and (if TwichellⒶapparatus note is as truthful a person as the character of his cloth requires him to be) General Sickles put aside everything connected with a future world in order to go out of this one in becoming style. And so he dictated his “last words”Ⓐapparatus note to that newspaper correspondent. That was Twichell’sⒶapparatus note idea—I remember it well—that the General, no doubt influenced by the fact that several people’s last words have been so badly chosen—whether by accident or intention—that they have outlived all the rest of the man’s fame, was moved to do his last words in a form calculated to petrify and preserve them for the future generations. TwichellⒶapparatus note quoted that speechⒺexplanatory note. I have forgotten what it was, now, but it was well chosen for its purpose.

Now when we sat there in the General’s presence listening to his monotonous talk—it was about himself, and is always about himself, and always seems modest and unexasperating, inoffensive,—it seemed to me that he was just the kind of man who would risk his salvation in order to do some “last words” in an attractive way. He murmured and warbled, and warbled, and it was all just as simple and pretty as it could be. And also I will say this: that he never made an ungenerous remark about anybody. He spoke severely of this and that and the other person—officers in the war—but he spoke with dignity and with courtesy. There was no malignity in what he said. He merely pronounced what he evidently regarded as just criticisms upon them.

IⒶapparatus note noticed then, what I had noticed once before, four or five months ago, that the General valued his lost leg away above the one that is left. I am perfectly sure that if he had to part with either of them he would part with the one that he has got. I have noticed this same thing in several other GeneralsⒶapparatus note who had lost a portion of themselves in the Civil War. There was General Fairchild, of Wisconsin. He lost an arm in one of the great battles. When he was Consul GeneralⒶapparatus note in Paris and we Clemenses were sojourning there some time or other, and grew to be well acquainted with him and with his familyⒺexplanatory note, I know that whenever a proper [begin page 289] occasion—an occasion which gave General Fairchild an opportunity to elevateⒶapparatus note the stump of the lost arm and wag it with effect—occurred,Ⓐapparatus note that is what he did. It was easy to forgive him for it, and I did it.

General Noyes was our Minister to France at the time. He had lost a leg in the warⒺexplanatory note. He was a pretty vain man, I will say that for him, and anybody could see—certainly I saw—that whenever there was a proper gathering around, NoyesⒶapparatus note presently seemed to disappear. There wasn’t anything left of him butⒶapparatus note the leg which he didn’t have.

Well, General Sickles sat there on the sofa and talked. It was a curious place. Two rooms of considerable size—parlors opening together with folding-doors—and the floors, the walls, the ceilings, cluttered up and overlaid with lion skins, tiger skins, leopard skins, elephantⒶapparatus note skins; photographs of the General at various times of life—photographs en civil; photographs in uniform; gushing sprays of swords fastened in trophy form against the wall; flags of various kinds stuck here and there and yonder; more animals; more skins; here and there and everywhere more and more skins; skins of wild creatures, always, I believe;—Ⓐapparatus notebeautiful skins. You couldn’t walk across that floor anywhere without stumbling over the hard heads of lions and things. You couldn’t put out a hand anywhere without laying it upon a velvety,Ⓐapparatus note exquisite tiger skinⒶapparatus note or leopard skin, and so on—oh,Ⓐapparatus note well, all the kinds of skins were there; it was as if a menagerie had undressed in the place. Then there was a most decided and rather unpleasant odor, which proceeded from disinfectants and preservatives and things such as you have to sprinkle on skins in order to discourage the moths—so it was not altogether a pleasant place, on that account. It was a kind of museum;Ⓐapparatus note and yet it was not the sort of museum which seemed dignified enough to be the museum of a great soldier—and so famous a soldier. It was the sort of museum which should delight and entertain little boys and girls. I suppose that that museum reveals a part of the General’s character and make. He is sweetly and winningly childlike.Ⓐapparatus note

Once, in Hartford,Ⓐapparatus note twenty or twenty-five years ago, just as TwichellⒶapparatus note was coming out of his gate Sunday morning to walk to his church and preach, a telegram was put into his hand. He read it immediately, and then, in a manner, collapsed. It saidⒶapparatus note “General Sickles died last night at midnight.”Ⓐapparatus note

TwichellⒶapparatus note has had many adventures. HeⒶapparatus note has more adventures in a year than anybody else has in five. One Saturday night he noticed a bottle on his wife’sⒶapparatus note dressing-bureau. He thought the label said “Hair Restorer,” and he took it in his room and gave his head a good drenching and sousing with it and carried it back and thought no more about it. Next morning when he got up his head was a bright green! He sent around everywhere and couldn’t get a substitute-preacherⒶapparatus note, so he had to go to hisⒶapparatus note church himselfⒶapparatus note and preach—and he did it. He hadn’t a sermon in his barrel—Ⓐapparatus noteas it happened—Ⓐapparatus noteof any lightsome character, so he had to preach a very grave one—a very serious one—and it made the matter worse. The gravity of the sermon did not harmonize with the gaietyⒶapparatus note of his head, and the people sat all through itⒶapparatus note with handkerchiefs stuffed in their mouthsⒶapparatus note to try to keep down their joy. And TwichellⒶapparatus note told me that he was sure he never had seen his congregation—theⒶapparatus note whole body of his congregation—the entire body of his congregation—absorbed in interest in his sermon, from beginning to end, before. Always there had been an aspect of indifference, here andⒶapparatus note there, or wandering,Ⓐapparatus note somewhere; but this time there was nothing of the kind.Ⓐapparatus note Those people sat there as if they thought, “Good for this day and train only:Ⓐapparatus note we must have all there is of this show, not wasteⒶapparatus note any of it.”Ⓐapparatus note And he said that when he came down out of the pulpit more people waited to shake him by the hand and tell him what a good sermon it was, than ever before. And it seemed a pity that these people should do these fictions in such a place—right in the church—when it was quite plain they were not interested in the sermon at all; they only wanted to get a near view of his head.

Well, TwichellⒶapparatus note said—no, TwichellⒶapparatus note didn’t say, I say, that as the days went on and Sunday followed Sunday, the interest in Twichell’sⒶapparatus note hair grew and grew; because it didn’t stay merely and monotonously green, itⒶapparatus note took on deeper and deeper shades of green; and then it would change and become reddish, and would go from that to some other color—purplish, yellowish, bluish, and so on—Ⓐapparatus notebut it was never a solid color. It was always mottled. And each Sunday it was a little more interesting than it was the Sunday before—and Twichell’sⒶapparatus note head became famous, and people came from New YorkⒶapparatus note and Boston, and South Carolina, and Japan,Ⓐapparatus note and so on, to look.Ⓐapparatus note There wasn’t seating capacity for all the people that cameⒶapparatus note while his head was undergoing these various and fascinating mottlings.Ⓐapparatus note And it was a good thing in several ways, because the business had been languishing a little, and now a lot of people joined the churchⒶapparatus note so that they could have the show, andⒶapparatus note it was the beginning of a prosperity for that church which has never diminished in all these years. Nothing so fortunate ever happened to JoeⒶapparatus note as that.Ⓐapparatus note

Well, he was telling—oh no, it was years ago, that he was telling about the sutler. In the Sickles brigade was a sutler, a Yankee, who was a wonderful person in the way of competency. All other sutlers got out of things on the eve of battle, during battle, after battle; not so with this sutler. He never got out of anything, and so he was very greatly respected and admired. [begin page 291] There were times when he would get drunk. These were periodical drunks. You couldn’t tell when he was going to have an experience of that kind, therefore you did not know how to provide for it. It was very necessary to provide for it, because when he was drunk he had no respect for anybody’s feelings or desires. If he wanted to do so and so he would do it; nothing could coax him to do some other way. If he didn’t want to do a thing nobody could persuade him to do it. On one of these occasions of sutlerian eclipse GeneralⒶapparatus note Sickles had invited some other GeneralsⒶapparatus note to dine with him in his headquarters-tent; his cook or his orderly, or somebody—the proper person—came to him aghast, and said “The sutler is drunk. We can’t have any dinner. There isn’t anything to cook and the sutler won’t sell us anything.”

“Did you tell him it was GeneralⒶapparatus note Sickles whoⒶapparatus note wanted these things?”

“Yes, sir. It didn’t make any difference with the sutler.”

“Well, can’t you get him to—”

“No, sir, we can’t get him to do anything. We have got some beans, and that is all we have got. We have tried to get him to sell us just a pound of pork for the General, and he says he won’t.”

GeneralⒶapparatus note Sickles said “Send for the chaplain. Let Chaplain Twichell go there. He is popular with that sutler; that sutler has great respect and reverence for Chaplain Twichell. Let him go there and see if he can’t prevail on the sutler to sell him a pound of salt pork for General Sickles.”

Twichell went on the errand—stated his errand.

The sutler propped himself unsteadily against some kind of a support, collected his thoughts, and the suitable words, and said,

“Sell you a pound of pork for General Sickles? Naw.Ⓐapparatus note Go back and tell him I wouldn’t sell youⒶapparatus note a pound of pork for God.”

That was Twichell’s story of the episode.

But I have wandered from that tree where General Sickles lay bleeding,Ⓐapparatus note and arranging his last words. It was three-quarters of an hour before a surgeon could be found, for that was a tremendous battle and surgeons were needed everywhere. When the surgeon arrived it was after nightfall. It was a still and windless July night, and there was a candle burning—I think somebody sat near the General’s head and held this candle in his hand. It threw just light enough to make the General’s face distinct, and there were several dimⒶapparatus note figures waiting around about.Ⓐapparatus note Into this group, out of the darkness, bursts an aide; springs lightly from his horse, approaches this white-faced expiring General, straightens himself upⒶapparatus note soldier-fashion, salutes, and reports in the most soldierly and matter-of-factⒶapparatus note way that he has carried out an order given him by the General, and that the movement of the regiments to the supporting point designated has been accomplished.

The General thanked him courteously. I am sure Sickles must have been always polite. It takes training to enable a person to be properly courteous when he is dying. Many have tried it. I suppose very few have succeeded.