laws and institutions against it are then wrong, and should be silenced and swept away. If it is right, we cannot justly object to its nationality and universality; but if it is wrong, we cannot justly insist upon its extension and enlargement."

SCHUYLER COLFAX.

XIX.

DANIEL W. Voorhees.

HEN I was a member of the House of Rep

WHEN

resentatives, during the war, there lived in the county of Owen, in my Congressional District, a gentleman by the name of Bullitt, related to the wellknown family of that name in Kentucky. His wife was a refined, cultivated, and very attractive woman. They were in moderate circumstances, but, in my travels and labors in their vicinity, I often partook of their warm and genial hospitality. Their friendship for me was constant and devoted, and I was strongly attached to them.

One gloomy, dark afternoon in the winter of 1863-4, while seated at my desk in the House, I received Mr. Bullitt's card, saying he was at the east door and wished to see me immediately. It was almost a year since I had met him, and I at once felt, I know not why, an ominous dread that some calamity had overtaken him. The moment I approached him, this presentiment became a certainty. His wife was standing by his side, with a look of

terror and anguish, which, once seen, could never be forgotten. Her face was white, her lips apart, and her eyes filled with an expression of intense fright, and at the same time, intense supplication against some impending and appalling disaster. They had come direct from the depot to the Capitol, and were travel-stained and without rest. We sought the shelter of a committee room, and there I heard from Mr. Bullitt, aided now and then in eager but suppressed tones by his wife, the cause of their hurried trip to Washington and of their deadly alarm.

Mrs. Bullitt's father was the Rev. Henry M. Luckett, a Methodist minister, then over seventy years of age. He had preached during his long life in Illinois, Kentucky, Missouri and elsewhere. At the time the rebellion broke out he was living at St. Charles, Missouri, and had saved up quite a competence for his old age. It happened that his means were so invested and situated that everything he had in the world was suddenly lost to him. The blow prostrated him. He was not physically strong, at best, and being of an excitable temperament, his nervous system became greatly impaired, and finally broke down. His mind and spirits partook of his general depression, and he took a very morbid view of his condition and of his future. He was exceedingly sensitive about being dependent on any one for support, and soon drifted into the gloomy belief

This

that he would become a pauper and die a public charge. These ideas were combated by his family and friends, but they deepened their hold on him. until he was really a monomaniac on that subject, although sound on all others. In this condition he visited a niece at Memphis, then in possession of the Federal forces under command of General Hurlbut. His excited and unguarded talk on the subject of his losses and his great anxiety to repair them, if possible, soon attracted the attention of certain vigilant detectives in the employ of the government. old man, shattered in health and unbalanced in mind, was not a difficult subject for their tact and skill. They found he was a Southern man by birth, and that he sympathized with the trials and sufferings of the Southern people. They assured him that the Southern people were at that time in the most urgent need of quinine and of percussion caps, and would pay fabulous prices for them; that there was no difficulty in trading through the lines; that they would put up the necessary amount of money, go into the enterprise with him, and make a large sum in the way of profits. This alluring scheme was successful in capturing its intended victim. The contraband articles were procured, a wagon with a false bottom was furnished to carry them to the enemy, and when all the details of the plot were ready, Mr. Luckett was arrested by his accomplices,