whom Winthrop speaks as "a gentleman of special parts, of learning and activity, and a godly man," was one of the leading men in the Massachusetts enterprise, but found it necessary to postpone his coming. The purpose of his address, as explained by Mr. Deane, was to bespeak kind consideration in England for the new plantation, to which Cotton's sermon related.

The sermon itself is a typical Puritan sermon, well worth reading again after these two centuries and a half simply as such. The sermon bristles with texts. There are three on the title-page, besides the main text from Samuel; and every statement from beginning to end is fortified by appeal to Ezekiel xx. 6, or some clinching Scripture. The sermon begins with David's purpose to build God a house, and the blessings promised. The transition is easy to the blessings upon a plantation established by God's people. A consideration of the three ways in which God makes room for a people leads to some words on the rights of the natives of the soil to be occupied. Then proper reasons for emigration are discussed, -the gaining of knowledge, lawful commerce, the "liberty of the Ordinances," a better chance elsewhere. "Nature teacheth Bees to doe so, when as the hive is too full, they seeke abroad for new dwellings: So when the hive of the Common wealth is so full, that tradesmen cannot live one by another, but eate up one another, in this case it is lawful to remove." So it is to escape certain evils, which are duly enumerated, or to carry on some work pointed out by God's providence. The latter part of the sermon is a charge to keep the plantation godly. He exhorts the departing colonists to "take rooting in the Ordinances," to be "not unmindful of our Jerusalem at home," to "offend not the poor natives," to "looke well to the plants that spring from you." "Goe forth," exclaims the preacher, in the finest passage in the sermon, "every man that goeth, with a publick spirit, looking not on your owne things onely, but also on the things of others. This care of universall helpfullnesse was the prosperity of the first Plantation of the Primitive church. Acts, 4, 32." The text referred to is that which declares that "the multitude of them that believed were of one heart and of one soul: neither said any of them that aught of the things which he possessed was his own; but they had all things common." We cannot for

get here that declaration of the Plymouth Company: "We doe holde ourselves straitly tied to all care of each other's good, and of ye whole by every one and so mutually"; and Robinson's charge to the little band: "With your commone employments joyne commone affections truly bente upon ye generall good, avoyding as a deadly plague of your both commone and spetiall comfort all retiredness of minde for proper advantage .; let every man represe in himself, and ye whol body in each person, as so many rebels against ye commone good, all private respects of men's selves, not sorting with ye generall convenience." The true communal spirit was with the fathers of New England at the beginning.

Cotton's farewell sermon was not a great prophetic utterance, like Robinson's at Delftshaven; but it was a notable sermon, preached by a great man on a memorable occasion. It is remarkable that the sermon should have been so completely forgotten, and it is important to have attention recalled to it.

The PRESIDENT read the following memorandum:

At the last meeting of the Society our associate Mr. Long read an interesting paper suggested to him by a recent instalment of the forthcoming Memoirs of Mr. Schurz, in McClure's Magazine. It related to Mr. Schurz's recollections of certain incidents connected with his appointment to the Spanish mission, in the early days of Lincoln's administration. After Mr. Long had closed, it will be remembered, I gave certain recollections of my own, connected with the same incident, quite at variance with the narrative of Mr. Schurz. I spoke of having myself been in Washington at the time, and remembering the incident referred to. My recollection was that Mr. Schurz had applied for the Prussian mission; that his appointment had, for manifest reasons, been wholly out of the question; that Mr. Seward, Secretary of State, had been placed in an embarrassing position in regard to it; and that the matter had been subsequently arranged, not altogether satisfactorily to Mr. Schurz, by his appointment to Madrid. The information came from my father, then holding extremely confidential relations with Secretary Seward; was contemporaneous with the incident; and my recollection of the facts was distinct and vivid. I also said that I thought it not im

possible some reference to the incident would be found in the diary of my father, who was then a member of Congress.

Curious on the subject, I have since examined the diary covering the time referred to. My so doing supplies another illustration of the utter worthlessness of memory, as a basis of history, when dealing with incidents long past. It recalls vividly the valuable as well as curious and entertaining paper once read here by our late associate Mr. Edward L. Pierce on this subject, and also my own subsequent comments on that paper, both now forming a part of our Proceedings.1

Recurring, however, to the diary of my father, I find the following entry, under date of Sunday, 10th March, 1861. He begins his record by mentioning a call paid the morning of that day on an elderly female relative, long a resident of Washington. He goes on to say that he found her "full of the gossip of the town about Mr. and Mrs. Lincoln, who are doing multitudes of strange things, in the midst of a population little disposed to favor. Mr. Sumner came to dine with us. He gives curious accounts of the errors on a larger scale. The difficulty with Mr. Lincoln is that he has no conception of his situation; and, having no system in his composition, he has undertaken to manage the whole thing as if he knew all about it. The first evidence of this is to be found in his direct interference in the removal of clerks in the Department; the second, in his nomination of persons suggested by domestic influence.

"In the evening we had visits from Governor Seward and his son and daughter, and from Mr. Eliot. Governor Seward asked a private conversation, in which he communicated to me the leading events in his relations with the President. He explained his own views of the policy to be adopted in foreign affairs, and the utter absence of any acquaintance with the subject in the chief. And as to men, he was more blind and unsettled than as to measures. The nomination of Mr. Judd, and a German named Kreischman for his secretary, to Berlin, were made without consultation, merely in fulfilment of a promise to give the former a cabinet appointment, from which he had been compelled to give way. As to the mission to England, Mr. Seward had pointed out the necessity now existing to give it a high character, and had named me as a fit1 2 Proceedings, vol. x. pp. 473-490; vol. xiii. pp. 177-197; vol. xvii. pp. 440–448.

ting person; but he delicately gave me to understand that it was received with no favor. On the other hand, Mr. Schurz had pressed the President so hard to go to Sardinia that he had been obliged freely to state the objections to his nomination; and, greatly to his surprise, early the next morning Mr. Schurz called upon him, and soon let him know that he had been made the master of his most confidential communications. This had compelled him to a frank and decided conversation. with Mr. Schurz, which ended with his consent to withdraw himself. And the President declared himself greatly relieved at this interference of his Secretary."

On

On the 15th Mr. Adams left Washington for Boston. the 18th his nomination to the English mission was sent to the Senate.

It thus appears I was entirely wrong in my recollections as to Mr. Schurz's desire at that time to get an appointment to Berlin, though in other respects my recollection was substantially correct. It will further be observed that my father's record is much more creditable to both Mr. Schurz and to Mr. Seward than that supplied by Mr. Schurz from memory in his printed Memoirs. It also gives a somewhat vivid idea of the utter confusion and lack of system which prevailed in Washington during the first month of the Lincoln administration.

The PRESIDENT communicated by title a copy of a private letter from Lieutenant-Colonel James Savage to his father, the Hon. James Savage:

This letter was written by James Savage, Jr., to his father, Hon. James Savage, formerly President of this Society. It is from a copy of the original made by Mrs. W. B. Rogers, the sister of the writer and the only surviving daughter of Mr. Savage. There is a Life of James Savage, Jr., by Mrs. Rogers in the Harvard Memorial Biographies (vol. i. p. 305). The operations described in the letter relate to the part borne by the Second Regiment of Massachusetts Volunteer Infantry during the campaign conducted by the Confederate General "Stonewall" Jackson against the Union Army commanded by Major-General N. P. Banks, in the Valley of the Shenandoah, during the months of May and June, 1862. A fuller and more critical narrative of this famous campaign as a

whole will be found in Lieutenant-Colonel G. F. R. Henderson's Life of "Stonewall" Jackson (vol. i. pp. 304-356). The special part played in it by the Second Massachusetts Infantry has also been described by General George H. Gordon, the first colonel of the regiment, in his volume entitled "Brook Farm to Cedar Mountain" (pp. 175-261), and also in his "Third Paper" on the History of the Second Massachusetts Infantry. Other correspondence relating to the same events will be found in the Letters of C. F. Morse, also of the Second Massachusetts, and subsequently its commanding officer (Privately Printed, 1898), and in the "Life and Letters of Wilder Dwight" (Boston, 1891), who was Major of the regiment at the time in question, and a little later on, September 17, 1862, was mortally wounded at Antietam, holding then the rank of Lieutenant-Colonel. The writer of the letter, James Savage, Jr., was, at the time of writing, Captain of Company D; he was, as Major, severely wounded in the battle at Cedar Mountain, August 9, 1862, and died at Charlottesville, Virginia, October 22 following. He then held the rank of Lieutenant-Colonel in succession to Dwight.

WILLIAMSPORT, MD., May 28th, 1862.

MY DEAR FAther, At midnight on Friday in our camp at Strasburg, we were roused from sleep and lay waiting marching orders until eight o'clock the next morning, when we got rumors of the attack at Front Royal and of the defeat of Kenly's Maryland regiment. The fighting force of our brigade was 2100 men, that of Donnelly's rather less. Our brigade was composed of the 2nd Mass., the 3rd Wisconsin, the 29th Penn. and the 27 Ind. Donnelly's brigade contained the 5th Coun., 28th N. Y. and 46th Penn.; on the march from Strasburg Donnelly's brigade led, and of ours the 27th Ind. had the rear. I think it was near Middletown that the enemy first made an attempt to cut off part of our column, and they harassed us occasionally firing shell until we had passed through Newtown. Just beyond this place a halt was made and the 2nd ordered to the rear to relieve the 27th Ind. Our endeavor was to gain time for the purpose of saving our immense wagon train, which consisted not only of the Division and brigade trains, and those of the several Regiments, but also of the Hospital. It was raining in the morning when we started, but towards noon the pike became excessively dusty, owing in great measure to the droves of beef cattle and of condemned horses which were driven every now and then through our column, making much confusion in the ranks. When the