OCR Text |
Show Unjust Laudation. There was a sort of praise service in honor of the memory of Carl Schurz, in New York, the other night. Some distinguished speakers took part, such as Grover Cleveland, President Eliot of Harvard, the Secretary of the Navy and many German and American scholars. As is usual on such occasions, the "guest" of the evening was pretty nearly apotheosized, but one speaker In his fervor cried out: "O for such a Senator now! What would the Empire State give for one such man or two such men?" Well, had Now York two juBt such Senators as Carl Schurz was, there would bo a row on within three days. Granting that Mr. Schurz was an honest man and that he had a most subtle and sovereign intellect, he at tho same time had not one ounce of practical sense and had, moreover, such vanity and egotism that ho was a misfit in every place he engaged to All. Coming a refugee from hi native land, and reaching the United Stales just when tho stage was being set for the mighty tragedy of the Civil wai. his voice was a trumpet-call and as an evangel of liberty, up to tho raising of the curtain for the opening act of that war, ho performed magnificent service. But there his usefulness ceased. He was a pitiable failure as a soldier, yet had the assurance to write a complaining and insolent in-solent letter to Mr. Lincoln, on the conduct of tho war; in tho Senate he was a perpetual irritant, but there was no healing in his remedies. Ho took his cue from Charles Sumner, whost occupation occu-pation was gono when the slaves were finally freed under tho abrasions of the war, and who spent the remainder of his vain life in sneering at all that was done, but who had not tho genius to propose anything better. We would not object to no matter how fulsome praise tho llttlo cotorlo of mugwumps might plas ter Carl Schurz's memory with, except that it is a reproach to many other much more sacred memories, mem-ories, tho memories of Lincoln, Grant, Chandler, Morton, Curtain, Andrews, Stanton all that splendid array of stalwarts who with only a thought of giving their country the very highest service, did things. That Carl Schurz, when in disgrace as a soldier, sol-dier, dared to criticise Abraham Lincoln's management man-agement of the war when the whole weight of tho mighty war was upon him, ought to be proof enough to any man that Carl Schurz was simply ;" at best an unbitted thoroughbred totally unfitted ,J ,fl for the carriage or the plough, and totally un- ! , ' .. ' 9 reliable under the stress of a four-mile race. ' '' fl |