At Seward's last night, who gave a party to the scientific men of the
Academy now here. The Cabinet, heads of the foreign missions, the learned
gentlemen and the committees on foreign relations of the two houses were
present, with a goodly number of ladies. Agassiz, Silliman, Professors Story
and Caswell, etc., etc., were present.
To-day at the Executive Mansion. Only Usher with myself was present,
and no business transacted. Mr. Hudson of Massachusetts, formerly Member of
Congress, was with the President. Conversation was general, with anecdotes as
usual. These are usually very appropriate and instructive, conveying much truth
in few words, well, if not always elegantly, told. The President's estimate of
character is usually very correct, and he frequently divests himself of
partiality with a readiness that has surprised me. In the course of
conversation to-day, which was desultory, he mentioned that he was selected by
the people of Springfield to deliver a eulogy on the death of Mr. Clay, of whom
he had been a warm admirer. This, he said, he found to be difficult writing so
as to make an address of fifty minutes. In casting about for the material, he
had directed his attention to what Mr. Clay had himself done in the line of
eulogy and was struck with the fact that, though renowned as an orator and
speaker, he had never made any effort of the sort, and the only specimen he
could find was embraced in a few lines on the death of Mr. Calhoun. Referring
to the subject and this fact on one occasion when Seward was present, that
gentleman remarked that the failure was characteristic and easily accounted
for, — Mr. Clay's self-esteem was so great, that he could tolerate no commendation
of others, eulogized none but the dead, and would never himself speak in laudatory
terms of a contemporary.
Both the President and Seward consider Clay and Webster to have been
hard and selfish leaders, whose private personal ambition had contributed to
the ruin of their party. The people of New England were proud of the great mind
of Webster, his great intellect, but he had no magnetism, there was not intense
personal devotion for him such as manifested itself for Clay. For years the
Whig cause consisted in adulation of these two men, rather than in support of
any well-established principles. In fact, principles were always made secondary
to them.
I see by the papers that John P. Hale made an assault on the Navy
Department, and tried to secure the adoption of a drag-net resolution, placing
the Department on the defensive for the residue of the session. Under pretense
of great regard for the country, he is really reckless and indifferent to its
interests. Instead of encouraging and aiding the Department in its labors, he
would divert it into a defense against groundless attacks from interested
persons.
SOURCE: Gideon Welles, Diary of Gideon Welles,
Secretary of the Navy Under Lincoln and Johnson, Vol. 1: 1861 – March 30,
1864, p. 506-7
