Never did Mr. Tilden appear to better advantage than during this exciting contest. He was entirely convinced of his election; he had millions of supporters; a word from him would have precipitated anarchy. It is to his lasting honor that, at that critical mo

RUTHERFORD BURCHARD HAYES.

ment, his every word and act was such as to preserve peace and order, even at the expense of the Presidency.

After the contest of 1876, Mr. Tilden retired from public life. In both 1880 and 1884 the greatest pressure was brought upon him to again accept the nomination for the Presidency; but this he firmly resisted, maintaining that by long and arduous service he had earned the right to retirement. The last work of his life was a plan for a great public library, to found which he left by his will the bulk of his large fortune. His beneficent design was frustrated, however, by legal flaws in his will, which his relations successfully con

tested, thus depriving him of the monument which his noble purpose and useful life deserved. He died in New York on August 4, 1886.

JAMES G. BLAINE,

THE BRILLIANT AND SUCCESSFUL STATESMAN.

HE close of the great civil war of 1861 marked a new era in American politics. The nation which was then restored to the people was a new nation. Freed from the blight of slavery, the country began to grow and expand with a rapidity which was absolutely startling. The South and West especially moved forward with giant strides. The permanence of the government being assured, the questions of the hour became those of reconstruction and pacification, of the rights of the freedmen, of internal peace and security, of foreign and domestic commerce, of tariffs and finance. Of the many able men who won their fame in the period since the war, there is none more prominent nor more widely admired and beloved than James G. Blaine.

Two States of the Union claim Blaine as a son. During most of his manhood and later life he lived in Maine; but he was born in Washington county, Pennsylvania, and the latter State always cherished for him the warmest affection, giving him in the presidential election of 1884 a popular majority unprecedented in the history of the State. He was, however, familiarly known as "The Man from Maine," and by that name will live in the memory of the people with that other great leader, Henry Clay, with whom he has often been compared. His life began on January 31, 1830. His father, Ephraim Blaine, was a farmer and justice of the peace, whose fortunes had become impaired by too generous living and lack of thrift. James was a healthy, happy, intelligent boy, showing, even in early childhood, some of the traits which afterward distinguished him as a man. His courage and pugnacity are illustrated by a story told of him at that time. A well was being dug near the house, and little James, then three or four years old, was led by curiosity to lean over and peer down into the "big hole." One of the workmen, fearing that he would fall in, tried to frighten him away by making faces and glaring at him, and making threatening gestures with a shovel. But little Jim was not so easily scared. To him it was a case for fighting, not for running. Picking up clods from

the heap of dirt by the well, he began to heave them in upon the enemy. This vigorous bombardment was more than the workman had bargained for; he feared that stones would follow next, and called for help. The boy's mother heard him, and came and led the pugnacious little fellow away.

When Blaine was about eleven, he lived for a time at Lancaster, Ohio, with his uncle, Thomas Ewing, then Secretary of the Treasury,-the same largehearted statesman who a few years before had taken into his family young William T. Sherman, the boy who was to become one of the great generals of the civil war. Mr. Ewing's home was a resort of statesmen and politicians,

and in that atmosphere no doubt the mind of young Blaine received a strong impulse toward a political career.

In 1843 he returned to his father's home, and entered Washington College, at Washington, Pennsylvania. He was an ardent student, and made rapid progress. Logic and mathematics were his favorite studies, but he also delighted in history and literature. He was always a leader among the boys, especially in debate. It is related that on one occasion, when he was ambitious to be elected president of the literary society, he committed "Cushing's Manual" to memory in one evening, in order to qualify himself on parliamentary practice. He had also a strong love for history, and it is said that he could recite from memory many of the chapters in "Plutarch's Lives."