"He called up the shade of the sword of that mighty warrior Joshua, which purified a polluted land with libations of blood, and made it fit for the heritage of God's people; the sword of David, that established the kingdom of Israel; the sword of that resistless conqueror, Alexander, that pierced the heart of the Orient; the Roman short sword, the terrible gladius, that carved out for the Caesars the sovereignty of the world; the sword of Charlemagne, writing its master's glorious deeds in mingling chapters of fable and history; the sword of Gustavus Adolphus, smiting the battalions of the puissant Wallenstein with defeat and overthrow even when its master lay dead on the field of Lutzen; the sword of Washington, drawn for human freedom and sheathed in peace, honor, and victory; then he bade the sword remember all it had done in shaping the destinies of men and nations; how it had written on the tablets of history in letters red and lurid, the drama of the ages; closing, he called upon it now, in the battle for the Union, to strike hard and strike home for freedom, for justice, in the name of God and the Right; to fail not in the work to which it was called until every shackle in the land was broken, every bondman free, and every foul stain of dishonor cleaned from the flag."



CHAPTER IX

IN THE THICK OF THE FIGHT

Company F at Newberne, N.C. The Fight at Batchelor's Creek. The Goldsboro Expedition. The Battle of Kingston. The Gum Swamp Expedition.

Breaking camp, the 46th left the beautiful, placid scenery about Springfield, its silver river, its silent mountains, for Boston, where they embarked for North Carolina, November 5th, 1862. They sailed out of Boston Harbor in the teeth of a winter gale which increased so in fury that the boat was compelled to put back. When they finally did leave, the sea was still very rough and they had a slow, stormy passage.

It goes without saying that many of the men were ill. The boat was crowded, the accommodations insufficient, and numbers of the Mountain Boys had never been on the water before. To the confusion of handling such a body of men was added inexperience in such work. The members of Company F would have fared badly had it not been for the forethought of their boy captain. It seemed as if he had passed beforehand in mental review, the experiences of these weeks and anticipated their needs. Out of his own funds, he laid in a stock of medicines and delicacies for the sick. Indeed, those who know, say that he expended all of his pay in sutler's stores and various things to make his men more comfortable. Night and day, he was with those who suffered, cheering, sympathizing, nursing. He was the life of the ship. His men saw that his kindness and comradeship were not of the superficial order, but genuine, sincere, a part of his very self and they became, if possible, more passionately attached to him than ever.

The placid Neuse river was a glad sight when at last they reached its mouth and steamed up to Newberne, North Carolina. General Burnside had already captured the town and Company F began army duties in earnest with garrison work in the little Southern city, with its long dull lines of earthworks, its white tents, its fleet of gunboats floating lazily on the river. The constant tramp of soldiers' feet echoed along the side-walks of this erstwhile quiet, Southern town. Sentries stood on the corners challenging passers-by, wharves creaked under the loads of ordnance and quartermasters' stores. Army wagons and ambulances were constantly passing in the street, all strange and novel at first to the Mountain Boys but soon familiar. Drilling and guard duty filled their days. Morning and afternoon they drilled, and the actual possession of the enemies' country, the warlike aspect of everything about them, made drilling a far more real and important matter than it had seemed at home. Captain Conwell felt his responsibility and threw himself into the work with an earnestness that infected his men. They would rather drill with him two hours than with any other officer a half hour. They not only caught the contagion of his enthusiasm, but he changed the dull, monotonous drudgery of it, into real, fascinating work by marching them into seemingly hopeless situations and then in some unexpected and surprising way, extricating them. Nor did he spare himself any of the unpleasant phases of the work. One day, the Colonel, while drilling the regiment, noticed that many of the men of Company F marched far out of their places to avoid a mudhole in the road. He marched and countermarched them over the same ground to compel the men to keep their rank and file regardless of the mud. Captain Conwell saw his object, and himself plunged into the mire, his men followed, and were thus saved the reprimand which threatened.

During these days, Captain Conwell kept up with the law studies abandoned at Yale. Every spare minute, he devoted to his books and committed to memory, one whole volume of Blackstone during the term of his first enlistment Not many of the soldiers so used their hours off duty. But it is this turning of every minute to account that has enabled Dr. Conwell to accomplish so much. He has made his life count for a half dozen of most person's by never wasting a moment.

The monotony of garrison duty was broken first by a small fight at Batchelor's Creek, seven miles above Newbern, but only four companies were engaged. The Mountain Boys saw the first blood spilled at Kingston and gained there the first glimpse of the horrors of war. Nearly the entire marching force was sent into the interior on this expedition, known as the Goldsboro expedition, the object being to cut the Weldon railroad at Goldsboro, North Carolina. It was a hard march with short and uncertain halts and occasional cavalry skirmishes. At Kingston, they met the enemy in force. The Confederates were massed about the bridge over the Neuse river and held it bravely till the charge of the 9th New Jersey and 10th Connecticut drove them from their position and left the woods and a little open field covered with the dead and dying. The 46th Massachusetts followed the retreating army and had that first experience with the grim, bloody side of war that always makes such a strong impression on the green soldier.

They bivouacked at Kingston and next day marched to the Weldon railroad, reaching it at the bridge below Goldsboro, where the Confederates had massed a large body of troops to protect their lines of communication and supplies. This was a battle in earnest, the artillery was deafening, and the enemy repeatedly charged the Union lines. The Northern batteries were on a knoll in front, and at the very moment that a long line of gray was seen approaching through this field and the Massachusetts men were ordered to lie down, so that the shot and shell could pass over them, their boy captain walked openly forward to the batteries and stood there in the smoke. Careless of himself, he yet realized to the full the meaning of this grim duel, for when the fight was over and the Northern men cheering, he was silent Captain Walkley asked why he did not cheer with the others. "Too many hearts made sad to-day," was the significant reply that showed he counted the cost to its bitter end, though he went forward none the less bravely.

Long, monotonous days of garrison duty followed for the men, days of drilling, of idling up and down the streets of the dull Southern town. But Captain Conwell used his spare minutes to advantage, and when no work connected with his company or the personal welfare of his comrades occupied him, he was studying. Then came the order to drive the Confederates from a fort they were erecting on the Newbern Railroad about thirty miles inland. This expedition, known as the Gum Swamp Expedition, was an experience that tested the mettle of the men and the resources of the young captain, and an experience none of the survivors ever forgot. It was a forced march, a quick charge. The Confederates fled leaving their fort unfinished. The Union men having successfully completed their work, began the return to Newberne, and here disaster overtook them. The Confederates hung on their rear, riddling their ranks with shot and shell. Suffering, maddened, with no way to turn and fight, for the enemy kept themselves well hidden, with no way of escape ahead if they remained on the road, they plunged into the swamp, that swept up black and dismal to the very edge of the highway. The Confederate prisoners with them, warned them of their danger, but the men were not to be stayed when a deadly rain of the enemy's balls was thinning their ranks every minute. The swamp was one black ooze with water up to their waists, a tangle of grass, reeds, cypress trees, bushes. Loaded down with their heavy clothing, and their army accoutrements, one after another the men sank from sheer exhaustion. No man could succor his brother. It was all he could do to drag himself through the mire that sucked him down like some terrible, silent monster of the black, slimy depths. But Captain Conwell would not desert a man. He could not see his comrades left to die before his very eyes, those men who came right from his own mountain town, his own boy friends, the ones who had enlisted under him, marched and drilled with him. Rather would he perish in the swamp with them. He worked like a Hercules, encouraging, helping, carrying some of the more exhausted. A wet, straggling remnant reached Newberne. Even then, when Captain Conwell found that two of his own company were missing, he plunged back into the swamp to rescue them. Hours passed, and just as a relief expedition was starting to search for him, he came back, his hat gone, his uniform torn into rags, but with one of the men with him and the other left on a fallen tree with a path blazed to lead the rescuers to him. No heart could withstand such devotion as that. Young and old, it touched his men so deeply, they could not speak of it unmoved. They would gladly have died for him if need be, as one did later, changing by his heroic act the whole current of Russell Conwell's life.

This same earnest desire to save that made him plunge back into that swamp, regardless of self, is with him still to-day, now that his whole soul is consumed with a longing to save men from moral death. He lets nothing stand in his way of reaching out a succoring hand. Then it was his comrades that he loved with such unselfish devotion. Now, every man is his brother and his heart goes out with the same earnest desire to help those who need help. The genuineness, the unselfishness of it goes straight to every man's heart. It binds men to him as in the old days, and it gives them new faith in themselves. The love of humanity in his heart is, and always has been, a clear spring, unpolluted by love of self, by ambition, by any worldly thing.



CHAPTER X

THE SWORD AND THE SCHOOL BOOK

Scouting at Bogue Sound. Capt. Conwell Wounded. The Second Enlistment. Jealousy and Misunderstanding. Building of the First Free School for Colored Children. Attack on Newport Barracks. Heroic Death of John Ring.

Once more, garrison duty laid its dull hand on the troops, varied by little encounters that broke the monotony and furnished the material for many campfire stories, but otherwise did little damage. The men eagerly welcomed these scouting expeditions, and when an especially dangerous one to Bogue Sound was planned, and Company F, eager to be selected, Captain Conwell personally interceded with the Colonel that his men might be given the task. The region into which they were sent was known to be full of rebels, and as they approached the danger zone, Captain Conwell ordered his men to lie down, while he went forward to reconnoitre. Noticing a Confederate officer behind a tree, he stole to the tree, and reaching as far around as he could, began firing with his revolver. Not being experienced in the shooting of men and believing since it must be done, "'twere well it were done quickly," he shot all his loads in quick succession. His enemy, more wily, waited till the Captain's ammunition was gone and then slowly and with steady aim began returning the fire. But Captain Conwell's comrades watching from a distance saw big peril, and disobeying orders, rose as one man and came to his rescue. The Confederate fled but not before he had left a ball in Captain Conwell's shoulder which, of little consequence at the time, later came near causing his death.

Thus the days passed away, and as the term of enlistment drew to a close, General Foster sent for Captain Conwell and promised to recommend him for a colonelcy if he would enter at once upon recruiting service among his men. This he willingly consented to do, and as may be imagined his men nearly all wanted to re-enlist under him. Such a commission, however, for one so young aroused bitter jealousy among officers of other companies, and Captain Conwell hearing of it, decided not to accept the appointment. He wrote the Governor that he would be content with the captain's commission again and that he preferred not to raise contention by receiving anything higher. The company returned home, but before the new re-organization was effected, Captain Conwell was attacked with a serious fever. By the time he recovered, the new regiment had been organized and new officers put over it. Of course, his men were dissatisfied. With the understanding that such of his old comrades as wished could join it, he went to work immediately recruiting another company. But nearly all his old men wanted to come into it, the new men recruited would not give him up, and the anomalous position arose of two companies clamoring for one captain. While it created much comment, it did not lessen the jealousy which his popularity had aroused, among men and officers not intimately associated with him, so that his second enlistment began under a cloud of disappointment for his men, and jealousy among outsiders, that seemed to bring misfortune in its train.

His new men, however, never failed him. His thoughtful care for them, his kindness, his unselfishness won their loyalty and love as it had done in Company F, and Company D, 2nd Massachusetts Volunteers were to a man as devoted and as attached to him as ever were his old comrades of the first days of the war.

In this company went as Captain Conwell's personal orderly, a young boy, John Ring, of Westfield, Massachusetts, a lad of sixteen or seventeen. Entirely too young and too small to join the ranks of soldiers, he had pleaded with his father so earnestly to be permitted to go to the war that Mr. Ring had finally consented to put him in Captain Conwell's charge. The boy was a worshipper at the shrine of the young Captain. He had sat thrilled and fascinated under the magic of the burning words which had swept men by the hundreds to enlist. It was Captain Conwell's speeches that had stirred the boy and moved him with such fiery ardor to go to war. No greater joy could be given him, since he could not fight, than to be in his Captain's very tent to look after his belongings, to minister in small ways to his comfort. A hero worshipper the lad was, and at an age when ideals take hold of a pure, high-minded boy with a force that will carry him to any height of self-sacrifice, to any depth of suffering. He had been carefully reared in a Christian home and read the Bible every morning and every evening in their tent, a sight that so pricked the conscience of Captain Conwell, as he remembered his mother and her loving instructions, that he forbade it. But though John Ring loved Captain Conwell with a love which the former did not then understand, the boy loved duty and right better, and bravely disobeying these orders, he read on.

The company was stationed at Fort Macon, North Carolina, for awhile, and then sent to Newport Barracks. Here it was that Captain Conwell and his soldiers cut the logs and built the first free schoolhouse erected for colored children. Colonel Conwell himself taught it at first and then he engaged a woman to teach. It is still standing.

Months passed away and the men received no pay. Request after request Captain Conwell sent to headquarters at Newberne, but received no reply. The men became discontented and unruly. Some had families at home in need. All of these tales were poured into the young Captain's ears. Ready ever to relieve trouble, impatient always to get to work and remedy a wrong, instead of talking about it, Captain Conwell decided to ride to Newberne, find out what was the matter and have the men's money forwarded at once. Leaving an efficient officer in command and securing a pass, which he never stopped to consider was not a properly made-out permit for a leave of absence for a commanding officer, he took an orderly and started. It was a twenty-mile ride to Newberne and meant an absence of some time. But he anticipated no trouble, for the rebels had been letting the Northern troops severely alone for nearly a year.

He had covered barely two-thirds of the distance, when a Union man passed, who shouted as he hurried on, "Your men are in a fight." Conwell and his orderly turned, put their horses to the gallop and rode back furiously. It was too late. The country between was swarming with Confederates. He ran into the enemies' pickets and barely escaped capture by swimming a deep creek, shot spattering all around them. He made desperate efforts to ride around the lines but failed. Then he tried descending the river by boat, but the enemy had captured the entire line of posts. Frustrated at all points, nothing was to be done but retrace his steps to Newberne, where the worst of news awaited him. The assault upon his fort had been sudden and in overwhelming force. His men had been shot down or bayonetted, the remnant driven to the woods. The whole ground was in the hands of the enemy.

Nor was this all. Back at that little fort had been enacted one of the saddest tragedies of the war. When the Union soldiers fled, they had retreated across the long railroad bridge that spanned the Newport river, and to prevent the enemy following, had set it on fire. Just as the flames began to eat into the timbers, John Ring, the boy orderly, thought of his Captain's sword, that wonderful gold-sheathed sword which had been presented to Captain Conwell on the memorable day in Springfield when he had so eloquently called upon it to fight in the cause of Justice. It had been left behind in the Captain's tent, the Army Regulations requiring that he wear one less conspicuous. Even now it might be in the hands of some slave-owning Confederate. Maddened at the thought, John King leaped on to the burning bridge, plunged back through the fire, through the ranks of the yelling, excited Confederates, reached the tent unobserved and grasped the sword of his idolized Captain. Again he made a rush for the flame-wrapped bridge. But this time the keen eyes of the enemy discerned him.

"Look at the Yank with the sword. Wing him! Bring him down." And bullets sped after the fearless boy. But he fled on undeterred, and plunged into the mass of flame and smoke. The fire had gained too great headway by this time for any living thing to pass through it unhurt. He saw it was useless to attempt to cross as before, and belting the sword about him, he dropped beneath the stringers and tried to make his way hand over hand. All about him fell the blazing brands. The biting smoke blinded him. The very flesh was burning from his arms. The enemies' bullets sung about him. But still he struggled on. In sheer admiration of his courage, the Confederate general gave the order to cease firing, and the two armies stood silent and watched the plucky fight of this brave boy. Inch by inch, he gained on his path of fire. But he could see no longer. In torturing blackness he groped on, fearful only that he might not succeed in saving the precious sword, that in his blindness he might grasp a blazing timber and his hand be burnt from him, that death in a tongue of flame be swept down into his face, that the bridge might fall and the sword be lost. At last he heard his comrades shouting. They guided him with their cheers, "A little farther," "Keep straight on," "You're all right now." And then he dropped blazing into the outstretched arms of his comrades, while a mighty shout went up from both sides of the river, as enemy and friend paid the tribute of brave men to a brave deed.



With swelling hearts and tear-blinded eyes, they tenderly laid the insensible hero on a gun carriage and took him to the hospital. Two days of quivering agony followed and then he met and bravely faced his last enemy. Opening his eyes, he said clearly and distinctly, "Give the Captain his sword." Then his breath fluttered and the little armor-bearer slept the sleep of peace.



CHAPTER XI.

A SOLDIER OF THE CROSS

Under Arrest for Absence Without Leave. Order of Court Reversed by President. Certificate from State Legislature of Massachusetts for Patriotic Services. Appointed by President Lincoln Lieutenant-Colonel on General McPherson's Staff. Wounded at Kenesaw Mountain. Conversion. Public Profession of Faith.

The tragic death of John Ring was the final crushing news that came to Captain Conwell at Newberne. Combined with the nervous strain he had been under in trying to get back to his men, the condemnation from his superior officers for his absence, it threw him into a brain fever. Long days and nights he rolled and tossed, fighting over again the attack on the fort, making heroic efforts to rescue John Ring from his fiery death, urging his horse through tangled forests and dark rivers that seemed never to have another shore. For weeks the fever racked and wasted him, and finally when feeble and weak, he was once more able to walk, he found himself under arrest for absence without leave during a time of danger.

It had been reported to General Palmer that the defeat of the Federal troops might have been avoided had the officers been on duty. An investigation was ordered and Captain Conwell was asked for his permit to be absent. He had simply his pass through the lines, a vastly different thing he found from an authorized permit of absence. The investigation dragged its slow course along, as all such things, encumbered by red tape, do. Disgusted and humiliated by being kept a prisoner for months when the country needed every arm in its defense, by having such a mountain made of the veriest molehill built of a kind act and boyish inexperience, he refused to put in a defense at the investigation and let it go as it would. Setting the Court of Inquiry more against him, a former Commander, General Foster, espoused his cause too hotly and wrote to General McPherson for an appointment for a "boy who is as brave as an old man." The Court of Inquiry, made up of local officers, most of them jealous of his popularity, resented this outside interference and the verdict was against him. But others higher in authority took up the matter and Captain Conwell was ordered to Washington. The President reversed the order of the Court. He was appointed Lieutenant-Colonel, detailed for service on General McPherson's staff and ordered West. General Butler, under whose command Captain Conwell served, afterward made a generous acknowledgment of the injustice of the findings and expressed in warm words his admiration of Captain Conwell, and the State Legislature of Massachusetts gave him a certificate for faithful and patriotic services in that campaign.

Nevertheless, it was an experience that sorely embittered his soul. Intentionally he had done nothing wrong, yet he had been humiliated and made to eat the bitter fruits of the envy and jealousy of others. It saddened but did not defeat him. His heart was too big, his nature too generous. He could forgive them freely, could do them a kindness the very first opportunity, but that did not take away the pain at his heart. One may forgive a person who burns him, even if intentionally, but that does not stop the burn from smarting.

Saddened, and with the futility of ambition keenly brought home to him, he joined General McPherson, and in the battle of Kenesaw Mountain he received a serious wound. He had stationed a lookout to watch the Confederate fire while he directed the work of two batteries. It was the duty of the lookout to keep Colonel Conwell and his gunners posted as to whether the enemy fired shot or shell, easily to be told by watching the little trail of smoke that followed the discharge. If a shot were sent, they paid no attention to it for it did little damage, but if it were a shell it was deemed necessary to seek protection.

Colonel Conwell was leaning on the wheel of one of the cannon when there was a discharge from the guns of the enemy. The lookout yelled, "Shot." But it was a fatal shell that came careening and screaming toward them, and before Conwell or his men could leap into the bomb-proof embankment, it struck the hub of the very wheel against which he leaned, and burst.

When he came to himself, the stars were shining, the field was silent save for the feeble moans of the wounded, the voices and footsteps of parties searching for the injured. He was in a quivering agony of sharp, burning pain, but he could neither move nor speak. At last, he heard the searchers coming. Nearer, nearer drew the voices, then for a moment they paused at his side. He heard a man with a lantern say, "Poor fellow! We can do nothing for him." Then they passed on, leaving him for dead, among the dead.

All that June night he lay there, looking up at the stars that studded the infinity of space. About him were dark, silent forms, rigid in the sleep of death. Those were solemn hours, hours when he looked death in the face, and then backward over the years he had lived. Useless years they seemed to him now, years filled with petty ambitions that had to do solely with self. All the spiritual ideals of life, the things that give lasting joy and happiness because they are of the spirit and not of the flesh, he had scoffingly cast aside and rejected. He had narrowed life down to self and the things of the world. He had no such faith as made his mother's hard-working life happy and serene because it transformed its sordid care into glorious service of her Heavenly King. He had no such faith as carried John Ring triumphant and undismayed through the gates of fiery death in performance of a loving service. Suddenly a longing swept over him for this priceless faith, for a personal, sure belief in the love of a Savior. One by one the teachings of his mother came back to him, those beautiful immortal truths she had read him from that Book which is never too old to touch the hearts of men with healing. Looking up at the worlds swinging through space to unknown laws, with the immensities of life, death and infinity all about him, his disbelief, his atheism dropped away. Into his heart came the premonitions of the peace of God, which passeth understanding. Life broadened, it took on new meaning and duty, for a life into which the spirit of God has come can never again narrow down to the boundaries of self. He determined henceforth to live more for others, less for himself; to make the world better, somebody happier whenever he could; to make his life, each day of it, worthy of that great sacrifice of John Ring.

He being an officer, they came back for his body, and found a living man instead of the dead. He was taken to the field hospital. One arm was broken in two places, his shoulder badly shattered, and because there was no hope of his living, they did not at once amputate his arm, which would have been done had he been less seriously injured.

Long days he lay in the hospital with life going out all about him, the moan of the suffering in his ears, thinking, thinking, of the mystery of life and death, as the shadows flitted and swayed through the dimly lighted wards at night, the sunshine poured down during the day. His love of humanity burned purer. His desire to help it grew stronger. Long were the talks he had with the chaplain, a Baptist preacher, and when he recovered and left the hospital, his mind was fully made up. Like his father, his actions never lagged behind his speech, and he made at once an open profession of the faith on which he now leaned with such happy confidence.

The fearless, unselfish love of humanity, the desire to help the oppressed that burned in the bosom of John Brown had sent the impetuous boy into the war.

The fearless, unselfish act of John Ring sent Colonel Conwell out of the war a God-fearing man, determined to spend his life for the good of humanity.

Providence uses strange instruments. Thousands in this country to-day have been inspired, helped, made different men and women through knowing Russell Conwell. What may not some of them do to benefit their country and their generation! Yet back of him stand this old gray-haired man and a young, fearless boy, whose influence turned the current of his life to brighten and bless countless thousands.



CHAPTER XII.

WESTWARD

Resignation from Army. Admission to Bar. Marriage. Removal to Minnesota. Founding of Minneapolis Y.M.C.A. and of the Present "Minneapolis Tribune." Burning of Home. Breaking Out of Wound. Appointed Emigration Agent to Germany by Governor of Minnesota. Joins Surveying Party to Palestine. Near to Death in Paris Hospital. Journey to New York for Operation in Bellevue Hospital. Return to Boston.

When Colonel Conwell was able to leave the hospital, he was still unable to assume active duty in the field, and he was sent to Nashville for further rest and treatment. Here he reported to General Thomas and was instructed to proceed to Washington with a despatch for General Logan. Colonel Conwell started, but the rough traveling of those days opened his wounds afresh and he completely broke down at Harper's Ferry. Too weak longer to resist, he yielded to the entreaties of his friends, sent in his resignation and returned home for rest and nursing. Before he fully recovered, peace was declared.

Free to resume his studies, he entered the law office of Judge W.S. Shurtleff, of Springfield, Massachusetts, his former Colonel, read law there for a short time, then entered the Albany University, where he graduated.

Shortly after passing his examination at the bar and receiving his degree, he was married at Chicopee Falls, March 8, 1865, to Miss Jennie P. Hayden, one of his pupils in the district school at West Granville, Massachusetts, and later one of his most proficient music scholars. Her brothers were in his company, and when Company F was in camp at Springfield after the first enlistment, she was studying at Wilbraham and there often saw her soldier lover. Anxious days and years they were for her that followed, as they were for every other woman with father, husband, brother or sweetheart in the terrible conflict that raged so long. But she endured them with that silent bravery that is ever the woman's part, that strong, steady courage that can sit at home passive, patient, never knowing but that life-long sorrow and heartache are already at the threshold.

Immediately after their marriage, they went West and finally settled in Minneapolis. Colonel Conwell opened a law office, and while waiting for clients acted as agent for a real estate firm in the sale of land warrants. He also began to negotiate for the sale of town lots. This not being enough for a man who utilized every minute, he became local correspondent for the "St. Paul Press." Nor did he stop here, though most men would have thought their hands by this time about full. He took an active part in local politics and canvassed the settlement and towns for the Republican and temperance tickets. He also was actively interested in the schools, and not only advocated public schools and plenty of them, but was a frequent visitor to the city and district schools, talking to the children in that interesting, entertaining way that always clothes some helpful lesson in a form long to be remembered.

True to the faith he had found in the little Southern hospital, he joined the First Baptist Church of Saint Paul. But mere joining was not sufficient. He must work for the cause, and he opened a business men's noon prayer-meeting in his law office at Minneapolis, rather a novel undertaking in those days and in the then far West. For three months, only three men attended. But nothing daunted, he persevered. That trait in his character always shone out the more brightly, the darker the outlook. Those three men were helped, and that was sufficient reason that the prayer-meeting be continued. Eventually it prospered and resulted finally in a permanent organization from which grew the Minneapolis Y.M.C.A.

Poor though he was, and he started in the West with nothing, he made friends everywhere. His speeches soon made him widely known. His sincerity, his unselfish desire to help others, his earnestness to aid in all good works brought him, as always, a host of loyal, devoted followers. A skating club of some hundred members made him their President, and his first law case in the West came to him through this position.

A skating carnival was to be given, and the club had engaged an Irishman to clear a certain part of the frozen Mississippi of snow for the skating. This he failed to do at the time specified and the club had it cleaned by some one else. Claiming that he would have done it, had they waited, the Irishman sued the club. Colonel Conwell, of course, appeared for the defense. The whole hundred members marched to the court house, the scene being town talk for some days. Needless to say he won his suit.

His love for newspaper work led him to start the "Minneapolis Chronicle" and the "Star of the North," which were afterward merged into "The Minneapolis Tribune," for which his clever young wife conducted a woman's column, in a decidedly brilliant, original manner. Mrs. Conwell wrote from her heart as one woman to other women, and her articles soon attracted notice and comment for their entertaining style and their inspiring, helpful ideas.

At this time they were living in two rooms back of his office, for they were making financial headway as yet but slowly. But times brightened and Colonel Conwell was soon able to purchase a handsome home and furnish it comfortably, taking particular pride in the gathering of a large law library.

It seemed now as if life were to move forward prosperously. But greater work was needed from Russell Conwell than the comfortable practice of law. One evening while the family were from home, fire broke out and the house and all they owned was destroyed. Running to the fire from a G.A.R. meeting, a mile and a half away, Colonel Conwell was attacked with a hemorrhage of the lungs. It came from his old army wounds and the doctor ordered him immediately from that climate, and told him he must take a complete rest. Here was disaster indeed. Every cent they had saved was gone. And with it the strength to begin again the battle for a living. It was a hard, bitter blow for a young, ambitious man, right at the start of his career; a stroke of fate to make any man bitter and cynical. But his was not a nature to permit misfortune to narrow him or make him repine. He rose above it. It did not lesson his ambitions. It broadened, humanized them. It made him enter with still truer sympathy into other people's misfortune. And his trust in God was so strong, his faith so unshaken, he knew that in all these bitter experiences of life's school was a lesson. He learned it and used it to get a broader outlook.

His friends rallied to his aid. Prominent as an editor, lawyer, leader of the Y.M.C.A., it was not difficult to get him an appointment from the Governor, already a warm friend. He secured the position of emigration agent to Europe, and he turned his face Eastward. Mrs. Conwell was left in Minneapolis, and he sailed abroad in the hope that the sea trip and change of climate would heal the weakened tissue of his lung and fully restore him to health. But it was a vain hope. His strength would not permit him to fulfill the duty expected of him as emigration agent and he was compelled to resign. For several months he wandered about Europe trying one place, then another in the vain search for health. He joined a surveying party and went to Palestine, for even in those days that inner voice could not he altogether stilled that was calling him to follow in the footsteps of the Savior and preach and teach and heal the sick. The land where the Savior ministered had a strong fascination for him, and he gladly seized the opportunity to become a member of this surveying party and walk over the ground where the Savior had gone up and down doing good.

But the trip was of no benefit to his health. Instead of gaining he failed. He grew weaker and weaker. The hemorrhages became more and more frequent. Finally he came to Paris and lying, a stranger and poor, in Necker Hospital was told he could live but a few days. Face to face again with that grim, bitter enemy of the battlefield, what thoughts came crowding thick and fast—thoughts of his young wife in far-away America, of father and mother, memories of the beautiful woods, the singing streams of the mountain home, as the noise and clamor of Paris streets drifted into the long hospital ward.

Then came a famous Berlin doctor to the dying American. He studied the case attentively, for it was strange enough to arouse and enlist all a doctor's keen scientific interest. When analyzed, copper had been found in the hemorrhage, with no apparent reason for it, and the Paris doctors were puzzling over the cause. "Were you in the war?" asked the great man. "Were you shot?"

"Yes."

"Shot in the shoulder?"

Then came back to Colonel Conwell, the recollection of the duel with the Confederate around a tree in the North Carolina woods and the shot that had lodged in his shoulder near his neck and was never removed.

"That is the trouble," said the physician. "The bullet has worked down into the lung and only the most skillful operation can save you, and only one man can do it"—and that man was a surgeon in Bellevue Hospital, New York.

Carefully was the sinking man taken on board a steamer. Only the most rugged constitution could have stood that trip in the already weakened condition of his system. But those early childhood days in the Berkshire Hills had put iron into his blood, the tonic of sunshine and fresh air into his very bone and muscle. Safely he made the journey, though no one knew all he suffered in those terrible days of weakness and pain on the lone, friendless trip across the Atlantic. Safely he went through the operation. The bullet was removed, and with health mending, he made his way to Boston where his loving young wife awaited him.

But out of these experiences, suffering, alone, friendless, poor, in a strange city, grew after all the Samaritan Hospital of Philadelphia that opens wide its doors, first and always, to the suffering sick poor.



CHAPTER XIII

WRITING HIS WAY AROUND THE WORLD

Days of Poverty in Boston. Sent to Southern Battlefields. Around the World for New York and Boston Papers. In a Gambling Den In Hong Kong, China. Cholera and Shipwreck.

Abject poverty awaited him on his return to Boston. The fire in St. Paul had left them but little property, while their enforced hurried departure compelled that little to be sold at a loss. This money was now entirely gone, and once more he faced the world in absolute poverty. He rented a single room in the East district of Boston and furnished it with the barest necessities. Colonel Conwell secured a position on "The Evening Traveller" at five dollars a week, and Mrs. Conwell cheerily took in sewing. Thus they made their first brave stand against the gaunt wolf at the door. Here their first child was born, a daughter, Nima, now Mrs. E.G. Tuttle, of Philadelphia. These were dark days for the little household. Night after night the father came home to see the one he loved best in all the world, suffering for the barest necessities of life, yet cheerful, buoyant, never complaining. So sensitive to the sufferings of others that he must do all in his power to relieve even his comrades in the war when, injured or ill, what mental anguish must he have endured when his dearly loved wife was in want and he so powerless to relieve it. She read his heart with the sure sympathy of love, knew his bitter anguish of spirit, and suffered the more because he suffered. But bravely she cheered him, encouraged him, and spent all her own spare minutes doing what she could to add to the family income.

Thus they pluckily-worked, never repining nor complaining at fate, though knowing in its bitterest sense what it is to be desperately poor, to suffer for adequate food and clothing. Colonel Conwell learned in that hard experience what it is to want for a crust of bread. No man can come to Dr. Conwell to this day with a tale of poverty, suffering, sickness, but what the minister's eyes turn backward to that one little room with its pitiful makeshifts of furniture, its brave, pale wife, the wee girl baby; and his hand goes out to help with an earnest and heartfelt sympathy surprising to the recipient.

But the tide turned ere long. Colonel Conwell's work on the paper soon began to tell. His salary was raised and raised, until comfort once more with smiling face took up her abode with them. They moved into a pretty home in Somerville. Colonel Conwell resumed his law practice and began, as in the West, to deal in real estate. He also continued his lecturing.

Busy days these were, but his life had already taught him much of the art of filling each minute to an exact nicety in order to get the most out of it. His paper sent him as a special correspondent to write up the battlefields of the South, and his letters were so graphic and entertaining as to become a widely known and much discussed feature of the paper. Soldiers everywhere read them with eager delight and through them revisited the scenes of the terrible conflict in which each had played some part. While on this assignment, he invaded a gambling den in New Orleans, and interfering to save a colored man from the drunken frenzy of a bully, came near being killed himself. Coming to the aid of a porter on a Mississippi steamboat, he again narrowly escaped being shot, striking a revolver from the hand of a ruffian just as his finger dropped on the trigger. He mixed with all classes and conditions of men and saw life in its roughest, most primal aspect But all these experiences helped him to that appreciation of human nature that has been of such, value and help to him since.

These letters aroused such widespread and favorable comment that the "New York Tribune" and "Boston Traveller" arranged to send him on a tour of the world. When the offer came to him, his mind leaped the years to that poorly furnished room in the little farmhouse, where he had leaned on his mother's knee and listened with rapt attention while she read him the letters of foreign correspondents in that very "New York Tribune." The letter he wrote his mother telling her of the appointment was full of loving gratitude for the careful way she had trained his tastes in those days when he was too young and inexperienced to choose for himself.

It was a wrench for the young wife to let him go so far away, but she bravely, cheerfully made the sacrifice. She was proud of his work and his ability, and she loved him too truly to stand in the way of his progress.

This journey took him to Scotland, England, Sweden, Denmark, France, Italy, Germany, Russia, Palestine, Arabia, Egypt and Northern Africa. He interviewed Emperor William I, Bismarck, Victor Emanuel, the then Prince of Wales, now Edward VII of England. He frequently met Henry M. Stanley, then correspondent for the London papers, who wrote from Paris of Colonel Conwell, "Send that double-sighted Yankee and he will see at a glance all there is and all there ever was."

He also made the acquaintance of Garibaldi, whom he visited in his island home and with whom he kept up a correspondence after he returned. Garibaldi it was who called Colonel Conwell's attention to the heroic deeds of that admirer of America, the great and patriotic Venetian, Daniel Manin. In the busy years that followed on this trip Colonel Conwell spent a long time gathering materials for a biography of Daniel Manin, and just before it was ready for the press the manuscript was destroyed by fire in the destruction of his home at Newton Centre, Massachusetts, in 1880. One of his most popular lectures, "The Heroism of a Private Life," took its inception from the life of this Venetian statesman.

He also gave a series of lectures at Cambridge, England, on Italian history that attracted much favorable comment.

Mr. Samuel T. Harris, of New York, correspondent of the "New York Times" in 1870, in a private letter, says, "Conwell is the funniest chap I ever fell in with. He sees a thousand things I never thought of looking after. When his letters come back in print I find lots in them that seems new to me, although I saw it all at the time. But you don't see the fun in his letters to the papers. The way he adapts himself to all circumstances comes from long travel; but it is droll. He makes a salaam to the defunct kings, a neat bow to the Sudras, and a friendly wink at the Howadji, in a way that puts him cheek-by-jowl with them in a jiffy. He beats me all out in his positive sympathy with these miserable heathen. He has read so much that he knows about everything. The way the officials, English, too, treat him would make you think he was the son of a lord. He has a dignified condescension in his manner that I can't imitate."

Part of the time Bayard Taylor was his traveling companion, and there grew up between these two kindred spirits an intimate friendship that lasted until Taylor's death.

All through the trip he carried books with him, and every minute not occupied in gathering material for his letters was passed in reading the history of the scenes and the people he was among, in mastering their language. Such close application added an interesting background of historical information to his letters, a breadth and culture, that made them decidedly more valuable and entertaining than if confined strictly to what he saw and heard. It was on this journey that he heard the legend from which grew his famous lecture, "Acres of Diamonds," which has been given already three thousand four hundred and twenty times. It gave him an almost inexhaustible fund of material on which he has drawn for his lectures and books since.

During his absence his second child, a son, Leon, was born. He returned home for the briefest time, and then completed the tour by way of the West and the Pacific. He lectured through the Western States and Territories, for already his fame as a lecturer was spreading. He visited the Sandwich Islands, Japan, China, Sumatra, Siam, Burmah, the Himalaya Mountains, India, returning home by way of Europe. His Hong Kong letter to "The Tribune," exposing the iniquities of the labor-contract system in Chinese emigration, created quite a stir in political and diplomatic circles. It was while on this trip he gathered the material for his first book, "Why and How the Chinese Emigrate." It was reviewed as the best book in the market of its kind. The "New York Herald" in writing of it said: "There has been little given to the public which throws more timely and intelligent light upon the question of coolie emigration than the book written by Col. Russell H. Conwell, of Boston."

These travels were replete with thrilling adventures and strange coincidents. When he left Somerville after his brief visit, for his trip through the Western States, China and Japan, a broken-hearted mother in Charlestown, Mass., asked him to find her wandering boy, whom she believed to be "somewhere in China." A big request, but Colonel Conwell, busy as he was, did not forget it. Searching for him in such places as he believed the boy would most likely frequent, Colonel Conwell accidentally entered, one night in Hong Kong, a den of gamblers. Writing of the event, he says:

"At one table sat an American, about twenty-five years old, playing with an old man. They had been betting and drinking. While the gray-haired man was shuffling the cards for a 'new deal' the young man, in a swaggering, careless way, sang, to a very pathetic tune, a verse of Phoebe Carey's beautiful hymn,

'One sweetly solemn thought Comes to me o'er and o'er: I'm nearer home to-day Than e'er I've been before.'

Hearing the singing several gamblers looked up in surprise. The old man who was dealing the cards grew melancholy, stopped for a moment, gazed steadfastly at his partner in the game, and dashed the pack upon the floor under the table. Then said he, 'Where did you learn that tune?' The young man pretended that he did not know he had been singing. 'Well, no matter,' said the old man, I've played my last game, and that's the end of it. The cards may lie there till doomsday, and I will never pick them up,' The old man having won money from the other—about one hundred dollars—took it out of his pocket, and handing it to him said: 'Here, Harry, is your money; take it and do good with it; I shall with mine.' As the traveler followed them downstairs, he saw them conversing by the doorway, and overheard enough to know that the older man was saying something about the song which the young man had sung. It had, perhaps, been learned at a mother's knee, or in a Sunday-school, and may have been (indeed it was), the means of saving these gamblers, and of aiding others through their influence toward that nobler life which alone is worth the living."

The old man had come from Westfield, Mass. He died in 1888, at Salem, Oregon, having spent the last seven years of his life as a Christian Missionary among the sailors of the Pacific coast. He passed away rejoicing in the faith that took him

"Nearer the Father's House, Where many mansions be, Nearer the great white throne, Nearer the jasper sea."

The boy, Harry, utterly renounced gambling and kindred vices.

While coming from Bombay to Aden, cholera broke out on the ship and it was strictly quarantined. It was a ship of grief and terror. Passengers daily lost loved ones. New victims were stricken every hour. The slow days dragged away with death unceasingly busy among them. Burials were constant, and no man knew who would be the next victim. But Colonel Conwell escaped contagion.

On the trip home, across the Atlantic, the steamer in a fearful gale was so dismantled as to be helpless. The fires of the engine were out, and the boat for twenty-six days drifted at the mercy of the waves. No one, not even the Captain, thought they could escape destruction. Water-logged and unmanageable, during a second storm it was thought to be actually sinking. The Captain himself gave up hope, the women grew hysterical. But in the midst of it all, Colonel Conwell walked the deck, and to calm the passengers sang "Nearer my God to Thee," with such feeling, such calm assurance in a higher power, that the passengers and Captain once again took courage. But strangest of all, on this voyage, while sick, he was cared for by the very colored porter whose life he had saved on the Mississippi steamboat.



CHAPTER XIV

BUSY DAYS IN BOSTON

Editor of "Boston Traveller." Free Legal Advice for the Poor. Temperance Work. Campaign Manager for General Nathaniel P. Banks. Urged for Consulship at Naples. His Work for the Widows and Orphans of Soldiers.

Returning to Somerville, Mass., the long journey ended, he found the editorial chair of the "Boston Traveller" awaiting him. He plunged into work with his characteristic energy. The law, journalism, writing, lecturing, all claimed his attention. It is almost incredible how much he crowded into a day. Five o'clock in the morning found him at work, and midnight struck before he laid aside pen or book. Yet with all this rush of business, he did not forget those resolves he had made to lend a helping hand wherever he could to those needing it. And his own bitter experiences in the hard school of poverty taught him how sorely at times help is needed. He made his work for others as much a part of his daily life as his work for himself. It was an integral part of it. Watching him work, one could hardly have distinguished when he was occupied with his own affairs, when with those of the poor. He did not separate the two, label one "charity" and attend to it in spare moments. One was as important to him as the other. He kept his law office open at night for those who could not come during the day and gave counsel and legal advice free to the poor. Often of an evening he had as many as a half hundred of these clients, too poor to pay for legal aid, yet sadly needing help to right their wrongs. So desirous was he of reaching and assisting those suffering from injustice, yet without money to pay for the help they needed, that he inserted the following notice in the Boston papers:

"Any deserving poor person wishing legal advice or assistance will be given the same free of charge any evening except Sunday, at No. 10 Rialto Building, Devonshire Street. None of these cases will be taken into the courts for pay."

These cases he prepared as attentively and took into court with as eager determination to win, as those for which he received large fees. Of course such a proceeding laid him open to much envious criticism. Lawyers who had no such humanitarian view of life, no such earnest, sincere desire to lighten the load of poverty resting so heavily on the shoulders of many, said it was unprofessional, sensational, a "bid for popularity." Those whom he helped knew these insinuations to be untrue. His sympathy was too sincere, the assistance too gladly given. But misunderstood or not, he persevered. The wrongs of many an ignorant working man suffering through the greed of those over him, were righted. Those who robbed the poor under various guises were made to feel the hand of the law. And for none of these cases did he ever take a cent of pay.

Another class of clients who brought him much work but no profit were the widows and orphans of soldiers seeking aid to get pensions. To such he never turned a deaf ear, no matter the multitude of duties that pressed. He charged no fee, even when to win the case, he was compelled to go to Washington. Nor would he give it up, no matter what work it entailed until the final verdict was given. His partners say he never lost a pension case, nor ever made a cent by one.

An unwritten law in the office was that neither he nor his partners should ever accept a case if their client were in the wrong, or guilty. But this very fact made wrongdoers the more anxious to secure him, knowing it would create the impression at once that they were innocent.

A story which went the rounds of legal circles in Boston and finally was published in the "Boston Sunday Times," shows how he was cleverly fooled by a pick-pocket The man charged with the crime came to Colonel Conwell to get him to take the case. So well did he play the part of injured innocence that Colonel Conwell was completely deceived and threw himself heart and soul into the work of clearing him. When the case came up for trial, the lawyer and client sat near together in the court room, and Colonel Conwell made such an earnest and forceful plea in behalf of the innocent young man and the harm already done him by having such a charge laid at his door that it was at once agreed the case should be dismissed, by the District Attorney's consent. So lawyer and client walked out of court together, happy and triumphant, to Colonel Conwell's office, where the pick-pocket paid Colonel Conwell his fee out of the lawyer's own pocketbook which he had deftly abstracted during the course of the trial.

The incident caused much amusement at the time, and it was a long while before Colonel Conwell heard the last of it.

Into work for temperance he went heart and soul, not only in speech but in deed. Though he never drank intoxicating liquor himself, he could never see a man under its baneful influence but that heart and hand went out to help him. Many a reeling drunkard he took to his Somerville home, nursed all night, and in the morning endeavored with all his eloquence to awaken in him a desire to live a different life. Deserted wives and children of drunkards came to him for aid, and many of the free law cases were for those wronged through the curse of drink.

Friend always of the workingman, he was persistently urged by their party to accept a nomination for Congress. But he as persistently refused. But he worked hard in politics for others. He managed one campaign in which General Nathaniel P. Banks was running on an independent ticket, and elected him by a large majority. His name was urged by Senators Charles Sumner and Henry Wilson for the United States Consulship at Naples, the lectures he had given at Cambridge, England, on Italian history having attracted so much favorable comment by the deep research they showed, and the keen appreciation of Italian character. He was considered an expert in contested election cases and he frequently appeared before the Legislature on behalf of cities and towns on matters over which it had jurisdiction.

Mr. Higgins, who knew him personally, writing of these busy days in "Scaling the Eagle's Nest," says:

"He prepared and presented many bills to Congressional Committees at Washington, and appeared as counsel in several Louisiana and Florida election eases. His arguments before the Supreme Courts in several important patent cases were reported to the country by the Associated Press. He had at one time considerable influence with the President and Senators in political appointments, and some of the best men still in government office in this State (Massachusetts) and in other New England States, say they owe their appointment to his active friendship in visiting Washington in their behalf. But it does not appear that through all these years of work and political influence he ever asked for an appointment for himself."

Catholics, Jews, Protestants and non-sectarian charities sought his aid in legal matters, and so broad was his love for humanity that all found in him a ready helper. At one time he was guardian of more than sixty orphan children, three in particular who were very destitute, were through his intercession with a relative, left a fortune of $50,000. Yet despite all these activities, he found time to lecture, to write boots, to master five languages, using his spare minutes on the train to and from his place of business for their study. In 1872 he made another trip abroad. Speaking of him at this time, a writer in the London Times says:

"Colonel Conwell is one of the most noteworthy men of New England. He has already been in all parts of the world. He is a writer of singular brilliancy and power, and as a popular lecturer his success has been astonishing. He has made a place beside such orators as Beecher, Phillips and Chapin."

Thus the busy years slipped by, years that brought him close to the great throbbing heart of humanity, the sorrows and sufferings of the poor, the aspirations and ambitions of the rich, years in which he looked with deep insight into human nature, and, illumined by his love for humanify, saw that an abiding faith in God, the joy of knowing Christ's love was the balm needed to heal aching hearts, drive evil out of men's lives, wretchedness and misery from many a home. More and more was he convinced that to make the world better, humanity happier, the regenerating, uplifting power of the spirit of God ought to be brought into the daily lives of the people, in simple sincerity, without formalism, yet as vital, as cherished, as freely recognized a part of their lives as the ties of family affection which bound them together.



CHAPTER XV

TROUBLED DAYS

Death of Wife. Loss of Money. Preaching on Wharves. Growth of Sunday School Class at Tremont Temple from Four to Six Hundred Members in a Brief Time. Second Marriage. Death of Father and Mother. Preaching at Lexington. Building Lexington Baptist Church.

Into this whirl of successful, happy work, the comforts and luxuries of prosperity, came the grim hand of death. His loving wife who had worked so cheerfully by his side, who had braved disaster, bitter poverty, hardship, with a smile, died of heart trouble after a few days' illness, January 11, 1872. It was like a thunderbolt from a cloudless sky. In the loneliness and despair that followed, worldly ambitions turned to dust and ashes. He could not lecture. He could not speak. The desolation at his heart was too great. His only consolation was the faith that was in him, a "very present help," as he found, "in time of trouble." This bitter trial brought home to him all the more intensely the need of such comfort for those who were comfortless. His heart went out in burning sympathy for those sitting in darkness like himself, but who had no faith on which to lean, nothing to bring healing and hope to a broken heart. Her death was a loss to the community as well as to her family. Her writings in the "Somerville Journal" had made a decided impression, while her sweet womanly qualities had endeared her to a wide circle of friends. Noting her death, a writer in one of the Boston papers said:

"Mrs. Conwell was a true and loving wife and mother. Kind and sympathetic in her intercourse with all, and possessed of those rare womanly graces and qualities which endeared her to those with whom she was acquainted. Her death leaves a void which cannot be filled even outside her own household. Her writings were those of a true woman, always healthful in their tone, strong and vigorous in ideas and concise in language."

Other troubles came thick and fast. He lost at one time fifty thousand dollars in the panic of '74, and at another ten thousand dollars by endorsing for a friend. His old acquaintance, poverty, again took up its abode with him. In addition, he was heavily in debt. Those were black days, days that taught him how unstable were the things of this world—money, position, the ambitions that once had seemed so worthy. The only thing that brought a sense of satisfaction, of having done something worth while, was the endeavor to make others happier, to put joy into lives as desolate as his own. Such work brought peace.

To forget his own troubles in lightening those of others, he went actively into religious work. He took a class in the Sunday School of Tremont Temple, that very Sunday School into which Deacon Chipman had taken him a runaway boy some twenty years before. The class grew from four to six hundred in a few months. He preached to sailors on the wharves, to idlers on the streets, in mission chapels at night. The present West Somerville, Massachusetts, church grew from just such work. He could not but see the fruits of his labors. On all sides it grew to a quick harvest.

The thought that he was thus influencing others for good, that he was leading men and women into paths of sure happiness brought him a spiritual calm and peace such as the gratification of worldly ambitions had never given him. More and more he became convinced it was the only work worth doing. The strong love for his fellowmen, the desire to help those in need and to make them happier which had always been such a pronounced characteristic, had set him more than once to thinking of the ministry as a life work. Indeed, ever since that childish sermon, with the big gray rock as a pulpit, it had been in his mind, sometimes dormant, breaking out again into strong feeling when for a moment he stood on some hilltop of life and took in its fullest, grandest meaning, or in the dark valley of suffering and sorrow held close communion with God and saw the beauty of serving Him by serving his fellowmen. That the inclination was with him is shown by the fact that when he was admitted to the bar in Albany in 1865, he had a Greek Testament in his pocket.

As soon as his means permitted after the war, he gathered a valuable theological library, sending to Germany for a number of the books. In 1875, when he was admitted to practice in the Supreme Court of the United States, he delivered an address that same evening in Washington on the "Curriculum of the School of the Prophets in Ancient Israel." From all parts of the Old World he gathered photographs of ancient manuscripts and sacred places, and kept up a correspondence with many professors and explorers interested in these topics. He lectured in schools and colleges on archaeological subjects, with illustrations prepared by himself.

It is not to be wondered that with his keen mind and his gift of oratory the law tempted him at first to turn aside from the promptings of the inner spirit. Nor is it to be wondered that even when inclination led strongly he still hesitated. It was no light thing for a man past thirty to throw aside a profession in which he had already made an enviable reputation and take up a new lifework. With two small children depending upon him, it was a question for still more serious study.

But gradually circumstances shaped his course. In 1874, he married Miss Sarah F. Sanborn whom he had met in his mission work. She was of a wealthy family of Newton Centre, the seat of the Newton Theological Seminary. One of the intimate friends of the family was the Rev. Alvah Hovey, D.D., President of the Seminary. Thus while inclination pulled one way and common sense pulled the other, adding as a final argument that he had no opportunity to study for the ministry, he was thrown among the very people who made it difficult not to study theology. Troubled in mind he sought Dr. Hovey one day and asked how to decide if "called to the ministry." "If people are called to hear you," was the quick-witted, practical reply of the good doctor. But still he hesitated. His law practice, writing, lecturing, claimed part of him; his Sunday School work and lay preaching, a second and evergrowing stronger part. His law practice became more and more distasteful, his service to the soul needs of others, more and more satisfying.



In 1874 his father died, and in 1877 he lost his mother, these sad bereavements still further inclining his heart to the work of the ministry. They were buried at South Worthington, in a sunny hilltop cemetery, open to the sky, the voice of a little brook coming softly up from among the trees below. This visit to his old home under such sad circumstances, the memory of his father's and mother's prayers that the world might not be the worse, but that it might be the better for his having lived in it, deepened the growing conviction that he should give his life to the work of Christ.

At last came the deciding event. In 1879, a young woman visited Colonel Conwell, the lawyer, and asked his advice respecting the disposition of a Baptist Meeting House in Lexington. He went to Lexington and called a meeting of the members of the old church, for the purpose of securing legal action on the part of that body preparatory to selling the property. He got some three or four old Baptists together and, as they talked the business over, "they became reluctant to vote, either to sell, destroy, keep, or give away the old meeting-house," says Burdette, in "Temple and Templars." "While discussing the situation with these sorrowful old saints—and one good old deacon wept to think that 'Zion had gone into captivity,'—the preacher came to the front and displaced the lawyer. It was the crisis in his life; the parting of the ways. In a flash of light the decision was made. 'It flashed upon me, sitting there as a lawyer, that there was a mission for me there,' Dr. Conwell has often said, in speaking of his decision to go into the ministry. He advised promptly and strongly against selling the property. 'Keep it; hold service in it; repair the altar of the Lord that is broken down; go to work; get God to work for you, and work with Him; 'God will turn again your captivity, your months shall be filled with laughter and your tongues with singing." They listened to this enthusiastic lawyer whom they had retained as a legal adviser, in dumb amazement 'Is Saul also among the prophets?' But having given his advice, he was prompt to act upon it himself. 'Where will we get a preacher?' 'Here is one who will serve you until you can get one whom you will like better, and who can do you more good. Announce preaching in the old meeting house next Sunday!'

"It was nothing new for Colonel Conwell to preach, for he was engaged in mission work somewhere every Sunday; so when the day came, he was there. Less than a score of hearers sat in the moldy old pews. The windows were broken and but illy repaired by the curtaining cobwebs. The hand of time and decay had torn off the ceiling plaster in irregular and angular patches. The old stove had rusted out at the back, and the crumbling stove-pipe was a menace to those who sat within range of its fall. The pulpit was what Mr. Conwell called a 'crow's perch,' and one can imagine the platform creaking under the military tread of the tall lawyer who stepped into its lofty height to preach. But, old though it was, they say, a cold, gloomy, damp, dingy old box, it was a meeting house and the Colonel preached in it. That a lawyer should practice, was a commonplace, everyday truth; but that a lawyer should preach—that was indeed a novelty. The congregation of sixteen or seventeen at the first service grew the following Sabbath, to forty worshippers. Another week, and when the new preacher climbed into that high pulpit, he looked down upon a crowded house; the little old chapel was dangerously full. Indeed, before the hour for service, under the thronging feet of the gathering congregation, one side of the front steps—astonished, no doubt, and overwhelmed by the unwonted demand upon its services—did fall down. They were encouraged to build a fire in the ancient stove that morning, but it was past regeneration; it smoked so viciously that all the invalids who had come to the meeting were smoked out. The old stove had lived its day and was needed no longer. There was a fire burning in the old meeting-house that the hand of man had not lighted and could not kindle; that all the storms of the winter could not quench. The pulpit and the preacher had a misty look in the eyes of the old deacons at that service. And the preacher? He looked into the earnest faces before him, into the tearful, hopeful eyes, and said in his own strong heart, 'These people are hungry for the word of God, for the teachings of Christ. They need a church here; we will build a new one.'

"It was one thing to say it, another to achieve it. The church was poor. Not a dollar was in the treasury, not a rich man in the membership, the congregation, what there was of it, without influence in the community. But lack of money never yet daunted Dr. Conwell. The situation had a familiar look to him. He had succeeded many a time without money when money was the supreme need, and he attacked this problem with the same grim perseverance that had carried him so successfully through many a similar ordeal."

"After service he spoke about building a new church to two or three of the members. 'A new church?' They couldn't raise enough money to put windows in the old one, they told him."

"'We don't want new windows, we want a new church,' was the reply."

"They shook their heads and went home, thinking what a pity it was that such an able lawyer should be so visionary in practical church affairs. Part of that night Colonel Conwell spent in prayer; early next morning he appeared with a pick-axe and a woodman's axe and marched upon that devoted old meeting-house, as he had marched against Hood's intrenchments before Atlanta. Strange, unwonted sounds saluted the ears of the early risers and awakened the sluggards in Lexington that Monday morning. Bang, Bang, Bang! Crash—Bang! Travelers over the Revolutionary battlefield at Lexington listened and wondered. By and by a man turned out of his way to ascertain the cause of the racket. There was a black coat and vest hanging on the fence, and a professional-looking man in his shirt sleeves was smashing the meeting-house. The rickety old steps were gone by the time this man, with open eyes and wide-open month, came to stare in speechless amazement. Gideon couldn't have demolished 'the altar of Baal and the grove that was by it' with more enthusiastic energy, than did this preacher tumble into ruin his own meeting-house, wherein he had preached not twelve hours before. Other men came, looked, laughed, and passed by. But the builder had no time to waste on idle gossips. Clouds of dust hovered about him, planks, boards, and timbers came tumbling down in heaps of ruin."

"Presently there came along an eminently respectable citizen, who seldom went to church. He stared a moment, and said, 'What in the name of goodness are you doing here?'"

"'We are going to have a new meeting-house here,' was the reply, as the pick-axe tore away the side of a window-frame for emphasis."

"The neighbor laughed, 'I guess you won't build it with that axe,' he said."

"'I confess I don't know just exactly how it is going to be done,' said the preacher, as he hewed away at a piece of studding, 'but in some way it is going to be done.'"

"The doubter burst into an explosion of derisive laughter and walked away. A few paces, and he came back; walking up to Colonel Conwell he seized the axe and said, 'See here, Preacher, this is not the kind of work for a parson or a lawyer. If you are determined to tear this old building down, hire some one to do it. It doesn't look right for you to be lifting and pulling here in this manner.'"

"'We have no money to hire any one,' was the reply, 'and the front of this structure must give way to-day, if I have to tear it down all alone.'"

"'I'll tell you what I'll do,' persisted the wavering doubter; 'if you will let this alone, I'll give you one hundred dollars to hire some one.'"

"Colonel Conwell tranquilly poked the axe through.' the few remaining panes yet unbroken in the nearest window and replied, 'We would like the money, and I will take it to hire some one to help, but I shall keep right on with the work myself.'"

"'All right,' said the doubter; 'go ahead, if you have set your heart upon it. You may come up to the house for the hundred dollars any time to-day.'"

"And with many a backward look the generous doubter passed on, half beginning to doubt his doubts. Evidently, the Baptists of Lexington were beginning to do something. It had been many a year since they had made such a noise as that in the village. And it was a noise destined to be heard a long, long way; much farther than the doubter and a great many able scientists have supposed that sound would 'carry.'"

"After the doubter came a good-natured man who disliked churches in general, and therefore enjoyed the fun of seeing a preacher tug and puff in the heavy work of demolition, for the many-tongued rumor by this time had noised it all around Lexington that the new preacher was tearing down the Baptist meeting-house. He looked on until he could no longer keep his enjoyment to himself."

"'Going to pull the whole thing down, are you?' he asked."

"'Yes, sir,' replied the working preacher, ripping off a strip of siding, 'and begin all new.'"

"'Who is going to pay the bills?' he asked, chuckling."

"The preacher tucked up his sleeves and stepped back to get a good swing at an obstinate brace; 'I don't know,' he said, 'but the Lord has money somewhere to buy and pay for all we need.'"

"The man laughed, in intense enjoyment of the absurdity of the whole crazy business."

"'I'll bet five dollars to one,' he said, with easy confidence of a man who knows his bet will not be taken up, 'that you won't get the money in this town.'"

"Mr. Conwell brought the axe down with a crashing sweep, and the splinters flew out into the air like a cloud of witnesses to the efficacy of the blow."

"'You would lose your money, then,' quietly said the preacher, 'for Mr.—— just now came along and has given me a hundred dollars without solicitation.'"

"The man's eyes opened a trifle wider, and his next remark faded into a long-drawn whistle of astonishment. Presently—'Did you get the cash?' he asked feebly."

"'No, but he told me to call for it to-day.'"

"The man considered. He wasn't enjoying the situation with quite so much humor as he had been, but he was growing more interested."

"'Well! Is that so! I don't believe he meant it,' he added hopefully. Then, a man after all not disposed to go back on his own assertion, he said, 'Now I'll tell you what I'll do. If you really get that hundred dollars out of that man, I'll give you another hundred and pay it to-night,'"

"And he was as good as his word."

"All that day the preacher worked alone. Now came in the training of those early days on the farm, when he learned to swing an axe; when he builded up rugged strength in a stalwart frame, when his muscles were hardened and knotted with toil."

"'Passers-by called one after another, to ask what was going on. To each one Colonel Conwell mentioned his hope and mentioned his gifts. Nearly every one had added something without being asked, and at six o'clock, when Colonel Conwell laid down the pick and axe at the end of his day's work, he was promised more than half the money necessary to tear down the old meeting-house and build a new one."

"But Colonel Conwell did not leave the work. With shovel, or hammer, or saw, or paint-brush, he worked day by day all that summer alongside the workmen. He was architect, mason, carpenter, painter, and upholsterer, and he directed every detail, from the cellar to the gilded vane, and worked early and late. The money came without asking as fast as needed. The young people who began to flock about the faith-worker undertook to purchase a large bell, and quietly had Colonel Conwell's name cast on the exterior, but when it came to the difficult task of hanging it in the tower, they were obliged to call Colonel Conwell to come and superintend the management of ropes and pulleys. Then the deep, rich tones of the bell rang out over the surprised old town the triumph of faith.' An unordained preacher, he had entered upon his first pastorate, and signalized his entrance upon his ministry by building a new meeting-house, awakening a sleeping church, inspiring his congregation with his own enthusiasm and zeal."

At last he had found his work. With peace and deep abiding joy he entered it. Doubts no longer troubled him. His heart was at rest. "Blessed is he who has found his work," writes Carlyle; "let him ask no other blessedness."



CHAPTER XVI

HIS ENTRY INTO THE MINISTRY

Ordination. First Charge at Lexington. Call to Grace Baptist Church, Philadelphia.

For this work he had been trained in the world's bitter school of experience. He had learned lessons there of infinitely more value in helping humanity than any the theological seminary could teach him. He knew what it was to be poor, to be utterly cast down and discouraged, to be sick and suffering, to sit in the blackness of despair for the loss of loved ones. From almost every human experience he could reach the hand of sympathy and say, "I know. I have suffered." Such help touches the heart of humanity as none other can. And when at the same time, it points the way to the Great Comforter and says again, "I know, I found peace," it is more powerful than the most eloquent sermon. Nothing goes so convincingly to a man's heart as loving, sympathetic guidance from one who has been through the same bitter trial.

He was ordained in the year 1879, the council of churches, called for his ordination, met in Lexington, President Alvah Hovey of Newton Seminary presiding. Among the members of the council was his life-long friend, George W. Chipman, of Boston, the same good deacon who had taken him a runaway boy into the Sunday School of Tremont Temple. The only objection to the ordination was made by one of the pastors present, who said, "Good lawyers are too scarce to be spoiled by making ministers of them."

The ordination over, the large law offices in Boston were closed. He gave his undivided time and attention to his work in Lexington. The lawyer, speaker and writer ceased to exist, but the pastor was found wherever the poor needed help, the sick and suffering needed cheer, the mourning needed comfort, wherever he could by word or act preach the gospel of the Christ he served.

His whole thought was concentrated in the purpose to do good. No one who knew him intimately could doubt his entire renunciation of worldly ambitions, the sacrifice was so great, yet so unhesitatingly made. Buried from the world in one way, he yet lived in it in a better way. Large numbers of his former legal, political and social associates called his action fanaticism. Wendell Phillips, meeting Colonel Conwell and several friends on the way to church, one Sunday morning, remarked that "Olympus has gone to Delphi, and Jove has descended to be an interpreter of oracles."

His salary at the start was six hundred dollars a year, little more than ten dollars a week. But it was enough to live on in a little New England village and what more did he need? The contrast between it and the ten thousand dollars a year he had made from his law practice alone, never troubled him.



The church was crowded from the first and the membership grew rapidly. His influence quickly spread to other than church circles. The town itself soon felt the effect of his progressive, energetic spirit. It awoke to new life. Other suburban villages were striding forward into cities and leaving this old Battlefield of the Revolution sleeping under its majestic elms. Mr. Conwell sounded the trumpet. Progress, enterprise, life followed his eloquent encouragement. Strangers were welcomed to the town. Its unusual beauty became a topic of conversation. The railroad managers heard of its attractiveness and opened its gates with better accommodations for travelers.

The governor of the state (Hon. John D. Long) visited the place on Mr. Conwell's invitation, and large business enterprises were started and strongly supported by the townspeople. From the date of Mr. Conwell's settlement as pastor, the town took on a new lease of life. He showed them what could be done and encouraged them to do it.

One of the town officers writing of that time, says: "Lexington can never forget the benefit Mr. Conwell conferred during his stay in the community."

Then all unknown to Mr. Conwell, a man came up to Lexington one Sunday in 1882, from Philadelphia, and heard him preach in the little stone church under the stately New England elms. It was Deacon Alexander Reed of the Grace Baptist Church of Philadelphia, and as a result of his visit, Mr. Conwell received a call from this church to be its pastor. It was like the call from Macedonia to "come over and help us." For the church was heavily in debt, and one of the arguments Deacon Reed used in urging Mr. Conwell to accept was that he "could save the church." He could have used no better argument. It was the call to touch Mr. Conwell's heart. A small church, and struggling against poverty; a people eager to work, but needing a leader. No message could have more surely touched that heart eager to help others, to bring brightness, joy and higher aspirations into troubled lives. It was a wrench to leave Lexington, the church and the people who had grown so dear to him. But the harvest called. There was need of reapers and he must go.



CHAPTER XVII

GOING TO PHILADELPHIA

The Early History of Grace Baptist Church. The Beginning of the Sunday Breakfast Association. Impressions of a Sunday Service.

The church to which Mr. Conwell came and from which has grown the largest Baptist church in the country, and which was the first institutional church in America, had its beginning in a tent. In 1870 a little mission was started in a hall at Twelfth and Montgomery Avenue by members of the Young Men's Association of the Tenth Baptist Church. The committee in charge was Alexander Reed, Henry C. Singley, Fred B. Gruel and John Stoddart. A Sunday School was started and religious services held Thursday evenings and Sunday afternoons. The little mission flourished, and within a year it was deemed advisable to put some one in charge who could give it his full time. The Rev. L.B. Hartman was called and the work went forward with increasing prosperity. He visited the families in the neighborhood, interested the children in the Sunday School, held two preaching services every Sunday and usually two prayer meetings during the week. In 1872, evangelistic services were held which resulted in a number of conversions. The need now became so imperative for a recognized church, that on Feb. 12, 1872, one was formally organized with forty-seven members, L.B. Hartman pastor, and John A. Stoddart, Henry O. Singley and G.G. Mayhew, deacons. The membership still increased rapidly, the little hall was crowded to discomfort, and it was decided to take a definite step toward securing a church building of their own. A lot was purchased at Berks and Mervine for $7,500, a tent with a seating capacity of 500 erected, and Grace Baptist Church had its first home. The opening services of the tent were memorable for many things.

After addresses had been made by Drs. Malcolm, Peddie, Rowland and Wayland, an effort was made to raise the twelve hundred dollars due on the tent. A wealthy layman, Mr. William Bucknell, offered to pay the twelve hundred dollars provided the members of Grace Baptist Church should henceforth abstain from the use of tobacco. The alert chairman said, "All who are in sympathy with Brother Bucknell's proposition, please rise." The entire audience arose. Mr. Bucknell made out his check next morning for twelve hundred dollars.

In 1874, the tent was moved to a neighboring lot, where it was used as a mission. Homeless wanderers were taken in, fed and pointed the way to a different and better life. From this work grew the Sunday Breakfast Association of Philadelphia.

A contract was made for a new church building, and in 1875 Grace Church moved into the basement of the new building at Berks and Mervine Streets. But dark days came. The financial burden became excessive. Judgment bonds were entered against the building, the sheriff was compelled to perform his unpleasant duty, and the property was advertised for sale. A council of Baptist churches was called to determine what should be done.

The sheriff was persuaded to wait. The members renewed their exertions and once more the church got on its financial feet sufficiently to meet current financial expenses. The plucky fight knit them together in strong bonds of good fellowship. It strengthened their faith, gave them courage to go forward, and taught them the joy of working in such a cause. And while they were struggling with poverty and looking disaster often in the face, up in Massachusetts, the man who was to lead this chosen people into a new land of usefulness, was himself fighting that battle as to whether he should hearken to the voice of the Spirit that was calling him to a new work. But finally he left all to follow Him, and when this church, going down under its flood of debt, sent out a cry for help, he heard it and came. To his friends in Massachusetts it seemed as if he were again throwing himself away. To leave his church in Lexington on the threshold of prosperity, for a charge little more than a mission, with only twenty-seven present to vote on calling him, seemed the height of folly. But he considered none of these things. He thought only of their need.

On Thanksgiving Day, 1882, he came. The outer walls of the small church were up, the roof on, but the upper part was unfinished, the worshippers meeting in the basement And over it hung a debt of $15,000. But the plucky band of workers, full of the spirit that makes all things possible, had found a leader. Both had fought bitter fights, had endured hardships and privations, had often nothing but faith to lean on, and pastor and people went forward to the great work awaiting them.

Out of his love of God, his great love of humanity, his desire to uplift, to make men better and happier, out from his own varied experiences that had touched the deeps of sorrow and seen life over all the globe, came words that gripped men's hearts, came sermons that packed the church to the doors.

It was not many months before his preaching began to bear fruits. Not only was the neighborhood stirred, but people from all parts of the city thronged to hear him.

In less than a year, though the seating capacity of the church was increased to twelve hundred, crowds stood all through the service. It became necessary to admit the members by tickets at the rear, it being almost impossible for them to get through the throngs of strangers at the front. Upon request, these cards of admission were sent to those wishing them, a proceeding that led to much misunderstanding among those who did not know their purpose nor the reason for their use. But it was the only way that strangers in the city or those wishing to attend a special service could be sure of ever getting into the church.

A Methodist minister of Albany gives a description in "Scaling the Eagle's Nest," of his attendance at a service that pictures most graphically the situation:

"I arrived at the church a full hour before the evening service. There was a big crowd at the front door. There was another crowd at the side entrance. I did not know how to get a ticket, for I did not know, till I heard it in the jam, that I must have one. Two young people, who like many got tired of waiting, gave me their tickets, and I pushed ahead. I was determined to see how the thing was done. I was dreadfully squeezed, but I got in at the back entrance and stood in the rear of the pretty church. All the camp chairs were already taken. Also all extra seats. The church was rather fancifully frescoed. But it is an architectural gem. It is half amphitheatrical in style. It is longer than it is wide, and the choir gallery and organ are over the preacher's head. It looks underneath like an old-fashioned sounding board. But it is neat and pretty. The carpet and cushions are bright red. The windows are full of mottoes and designs. But in the evening under the brilliant lights the figures could not be made out.