FOOTNOTES:

John Kelly(AT THE AGE OF 35 YEARS.)

Mr. Kelly went to Washington in the winter of 1855 to succeed the brilliant Mike Walsh in the House of Representatives. How did the weighty statesmenreceive him? He went into their midst a big-boned, heavy-browed, brawny stranger, with his far-seeing eye, and firm solid step, and as he strode in among the Solons of Washington they all felt an instantaneous conviction from his conversation and bearing that in the society of the most eminent men of the Republic John Kelly was exactly where he was entitled to be. He flattered no great man by the least symptom of being himself flattered by his notice. He measured his strength in discussion with the most celebrated men in Congress, and feared the face of none. At their social gatherings he responded to the brilliantbon motsof the wits of the capital by quiet strokes of humor, and anecdote, and story, that sent bursts of merriment through the circle, delighting the sensible, and penetrating even those who encased themselves in triple folds of aristocratic reserve.

There is nothing artificial about him, but he has been always, and was so particularly in those days, the child of nature, with no shadow of pretension or affectation in his manners. He was not simply a man lifted up from the ranks of toil to be noticed by the world’s favored ones, but he was endowed with that greatness of soul which always distinguishes its possessor above his fellows, whether his lot be cast in the highest or lowest situation of life. It is not strange that New York has felt, and will continue to feel, the moral influence of this man as long as he continuesto take part in its affairs, loved by the masses for his lion-like courage, and by friends who meet him face to face in retirement for his almost womanly gentleness, while for obvious reasons he is hated and vilified by those who do not appreciate such qualities. And this courage and gentleness and unruffled equanimity come all in a breath, perfectly natural and free, for they come of their own accord. His composure under all circumstances has often been remarked upon, and in the hurly-burly of New York politics, and the headlong rush of the tide of life in the great metropolis, John Kelly is as sedate and recollected as the ascetic in his cloister. But there is nothing of sourness in his temper. Reflecting much at all times, he possesses the rare gift of thinking while he is talking, and when he is expressing one idea his thoughts never outrun the present sentence, as do those of nine-tenths of people, to frame words for the next one. He does not, in short, think of what he is going to say next, but of what he is saying now. Among the finer shades of character that distinguish one man from another it is extremely difficult to define that untranslatable something which gives to each person his individuality; but this intentness of Mr. Kelly upon the immediate subject under consideration, both as listener and talker, is wonderfully attractive, and constitutes one of the subtle forces of his character as a political leader. This faculty of concentration belongsexclusively to original minds. Self-reliant, and borrowing nothing from others as to style or conduct, he gets at the point without labored approaches, and acts great parts with a happy carelessness. When others have been cast down and worried with care over affairs in which Mr. Kelly was more interested than themselves, his elastic spirit has not given way. Loving thus the sunshine, he affords a conspicuous example of the truth of the inspired words, “a merry man doeth good like a medicine.” Nothing has ever dispelled his cheerfulness. Defeat, deprivation of office, desertion by those he trusted, and who owed all they were to him, have neither embittered him, cast him down, daunted his courage, nor shaken his faith in himself. Domestic afflictions such as few men ever know—the death of his entire family—have come upon him, and while the keen shaft scarred the granite, his constancy has remained, and neither head nor chastened heart succumbed to misanthropy or rebellion against Providence. Surely something more substantial than wit, or genius, or equable temper was required to sustain John Kelly in the trials he has borne. The natural can only accomplish the natural, but a good man draws from supernatural fountains to replenish the well-springs in the arid plains of the desert, and Christianity, not for holiday show but daily use, must have been this man’s sheet-anchor.

Those acquainted with Mr. Kelly will be proper judges of the fidelity or shortcomings of this picture. They who have read the absurd delineations of him in some of the newspapers, and accept them without more inquiry as reliable, may reject this description of his character as contradictory of their preconceived notions on the subject. There is a third class of witnesses—an increasing class—perhaps more impartial than the two former ones, whose testimony on the point is important. These are strangers who have formed violent prejudices against the man after reading certain newspapers, but who on becoming acquainted with him repudiate their own opinions as rash and preposterously unjust.

“Oh!” but say his enemies, “this is not a fair test; Kelly is plausible and fair-spoken, and has great personal magnetism. Strangers when they meet him fall under his spell.” The objection is a weak one, for these strangers never relapse into their former absurd opinions after they have gone away, and withdrawn themselves out of his spell. Let such strangers decide as to the faithfulness or unfaithfulness of the picture sketched here. A case of the kind occurred at the Cincinnati Democratic Convention in 1880. A delegate to the Convention from the State of Rhode Island was very severe on John Kelly. He had been reading an unfriendly newspaper. He denounced him as a boss, and uttered many just sentiments on theevils of bossism. While he was speaking John Kelly and Augustus Schell passed by, and the former was pointed out to him. “Is that Kelly?” said he. “Well, he doesn’t look much like a New York rough, or bar-room bully anyhow. I have been told he was both.” An introduction followed, and a conversation took place between the delegate and the subject of his recent execrations. “I am greatly obliged to you,” said the Rhode Island delegate to the author of this memoir, who gave the introduction, after Mr. Kelly had parted from him and re-joined Mr. Schell. “I honestly detested John Kelly, as a low, ignorant ward politician, who had conducted a gang of rowdies to this Convention to try and overawe it. So I had been told again and again. Now I don’t believe a word of it. I never talked to a more sensible man, and modest gentleman than John Kelly. This opens my eyes to the whole business.”

In the course of this chapter particular attention has been directed to Mr. Kelly’s war on Know-Nothingism as his chief claim to distinction and the gratitude of his country during his younger days. He became identified with the cause of equal rights in the minds of adopted citizens of various nationalities, especially of the Irish, and contributed as much, after Henry A. Wise, towards the overthrow of the Know-Nothing party, as any man in the United States. The adopted citizens were proud of their champion, andthe place which he gained in their affections became so deep that, like Daniel O’Connell in Ireland, he could sway them by his simple word as completely as a general at the head of his army directs its movements. Mr. Kelly never abused this confidence, and consequently has retained his influence to the present day. Many have marvelled at his hold on the people of New York, as great when out of power, as when he has had the patronage of office at his disposal. Among the causes which have conspired to give him the largest Personal following of any man of the present generation, his patriotic services in the old Native American and Know-Nothing days must be reckoned among the chief. Such a hold Dean Swift had upon Irishmen in the eighteenth century. Nothing could break it, nothing weaken it, the King on his throne could not withstand the author of the Drapier’s Letters in his obscure Deanery in Ireland. It is fortunate John Kelly is a just and honest man, unmoved by clamor, not to be bribed by place or power, nor seduced by the temptations of ambition; for were it otherwise, his sway over great multitudes of men might enable him to lead them to the right or left, whichsoever way he might list, a momentous power for good or evil. The politician who ignores this man’s influence, the historian who omits it from his calculation of causes, has not looked below the surface of things, and knowsnothing of the real state of affairs in the city and State of New York.

Alexander H. Stephens was acquainted with John Kelly for over a quarter of a century; came into daily contact with him for four years on the floor of Congress; served with him for two years on the Committee of Ways and Means in the House; and his estimate of Mr. Kelly’s character, referred to at a former page, is entitled to respectful consideration from every man in the United States, especially on the part of those who know nothing about him except what they have read in partisan newspapers. “I have often said, and now repeat,” declared Georgia’s great Commoner, “that I regard John Kelly as the ablest, purest and truest statesman that I have ever met with from New York.”

FOOTNOTES:[6]Cleveland’s Life of A. H Stephens, p. 469.[7]The greater number of those he was addressing were Know-Nothings.[8]Cleveland’s Life of A. H. Stephens, p. 472,et seq.[9]The Carolina Tribute to Calhoun (Rhett’s oration), p. 350.

[6]Cleveland’s Life of A. H Stephens, p. 469.

[7]The greater number of those he was addressing were Know-Nothings.

[8]Cleveland’s Life of A. H. Stephens, p. 472,et seq.

[9]The Carolina Tribute to Calhoun (Rhett’s oration), p. 350.

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