began to make use of the document thus dishonorably acquired to arouse the susceptibilities of the national as well as of the Irish feeling at any attempt whatever by a foreign power to influence our internal policy, remonstrances were made by Mr. Bayard to the British Foreign Office in London. Lord Salisbury replied that, before he could recall a British Minister, he must know the charges against him. A compliance with this request would have involved delay, and been again described as yielding to England. The extreme step was, therefore, resolved on by the President, who, it is said, dictated his course to Mr. Bayard, of dismissing the English Minister; and on the 20th of October Sir Lionel Sackville-West, Lord Sackville, received his passports. But even this assertion of the national honor did not avail Cleveland. Those who had clamored for the dismissal of the Minister denounced it as too tardy, while an equally numerous party regarded it as an ignominious yielding to popular clamor, unworthy of a great nation and a strong Government, and especially uncalled for when the British Government had the question of recall under consideration, and merely asked for information and time. The British Government resented the action by not appointing a successor to Lord Sackville till a new President was inaugurated.

In 1887 another mistake of a high officer created justly considerable feeling prejudicial to Mr. Cleveland's candidacy. This was the recommendation of Adjutant-General Drum advising the restoration of the battle-flags captured from the soldiers of Confederate States during the war to the various States whose regiments had borne them. The recommendation was signed and approved of by the President, But at once widespread indignation was expressed. The Grand Army of the Republic, the well-known organization of veterans, was loud in its denunciations of such a measure. Everywhere it was felt that a great blunder had been made. That the President was only guilty of thoughtlessness was not conceded. He was regarded as the author of the measure, and it was described as a natural outcome of Democratic consideration for the Southern States, a consideration which, it was added, was evidenced by the President's vetoes of so many pension bills. The flags were not returned, as it was discovered that they had become the property of the nation, and could not be restored without an act of Congress. But this, too, came too late, and the affair nearly led to an open insult to the President by the encampment of the Grand Army of the Republic when the President visited St. Louis during a tour through the Western States.

The appointment of the Secretary of the Interior, Lucius Q. C. Lamar, to the Supreme Bench also provoked much criticism. It was remembered that Mr. Lamar had sat in Congress, and left it to sit in the Confederate

CHAP. XXXVI.

INSURRECTION IN HAYTI.

1869 Congress, and that he had held command in the Confederate army, and it was loudly argued that such a man was unfit to sit in a court that had to decide constitutional questions, even if he had displayed any legal abilities; but, in place of being a Taney, or a Marshall, he was a dreamy scholar, who had not even distinguished himself by industry in his Secretariate. After considerable delay, the nomination was approved by the Senate, but of course the Republican party found it a good weapon of attack in the campaign.

While measures already described were being taken to secure the independence of Samoa as necessary fo the security of the United States on the Pacific coast, in view of any car il or canals being cut through the isthmus of Central America, disturbances that might easily have led to foreign intervention, or at least embarrassing intrigues by European powers, broke out in the Republic of Hayti. On the second of June, 1888, President Salomon was expelled from his office by two officers holding high commands in the Haytian army-Generals Manigat and Légitime. Against the pretensions of these two men, a revolt was organized in the northern part of the island by General Thélémaque. Cape Haytien was the headquarters of this faction, and the districts of Gonaives and St. Marc followed its example. A Provisional Government was organized for the election of a new President, and by it a body of eighty-four Presidential electors was constituted, to choose the new executive. A canvass of these electors before the official meeting of the body, disclosed the fact that the probability was that General Thélémaque would be elected by a large majority. He was, however, before the day of election, killed in a riot at Port-au-Prince, and Légitime was declared President. He at once seized the treasury, and assumed all the powers of a dictator. A strong opposition to him had already existed in the northern provinces, and this was intensified by the killing of General Thélémaque, which his partisans did not hesitate to describe as a murder, instigated, if not ordered, by Légitime. Another revolt broke out at Cape Haytien, under General Hippolyte, and Légitime announced the blockade of the northern ports, and attempted to make it effective by dispatching thither his two war-ships, the Dessalines and the Toussaint Louverture. These vessels, on the 21st of October, signalized themselves by seizing an American steamer, the Haytian Republic, which was duly condemned by Légitime's courts as a lawful prize. The American Minister at once protested, on the ground that the blockade was not an effective, but only a paper one, and that the Haytian Republic had done no illegal act. To give strength to his protest, the Boston opportunely came into the harbor, and in the following week the Yantic and Galena arrived, to support their consort. With this display of force on the part of the Americans, the vessel seized and

condemned was turned over to Admiral Luce, and a compensation for damages paid to its owners. Disturbances, however, still continued, trade everywhere began to suffer, and at the same time a report was spread that intrigues were carried on, with a view to give the protectorate of the republic to France. The report seems to have been set afloat by irresponsible parties, with a view to test the feeling of that country. It was well known that she had never thoroughly reconciled herself to the separation of this former colony from her dominions. Napoleon the First expended 60,000 men in a vain attempt to recover the island, nd Napoleon the Third had plotted for the same end. The collapse of M. d Lesseps' scheme of a canal through the Isthmus of Panama, to which we h..ve already alluded (p. 1792), when mentioning his visit to this country in 1880, led to considerable pressure being put on the French Government either to complete the canal as a Government undertaking or to give it such official support as would insure the French shareholders from imminent ruin. In either of these contingencies the possession of Hayti would be of incalculable advantage to France, and in the agitated condition of political parties in the French Republic, it was impossible to foresee what rash plans might not be favored by some of the ambitious aspirants to power. The very fact that such a proposal as the establishment of a French protectorate had been mooted, even by irresponsible parties, even in the face of repudiation of such schemes by the French Government, brought before the minds of thinking men the dangers which, however improbable, might still, possibly, menace American rights and the maintenance of the Monroe Doctrine. The policy of our Government and the sentiment of our people are averse to schemes of control or purchase or conquest of the islands, like Hayti or Cuba, that are of as great strategic and commercial importance to us as any of the near and distant possessions of England that she has gained, held, and fortified. Yet President Grant came near acquiring the Bay of Samana, on the San Domingo end of the island, and would have completed the purchase but for scandals that attracted more popular attention than the real advantages of such an addition to our naval and commercial positions.

The present situation in Hayti-with a chronic, yet only partially successful, revolution tempting the natives to resort to intrigues with foreign. powers, especially with France, and the development of our new navy and enlargement of our policy in regard to naval and commercial stationscompelled our Government to keep a watchful eye over affairs in the island and the parties that are striving for supreme power in a manner that interrupts our trade and endangers our citizens.

In 1888 another great American soldier went to his last home. General

CHAP. XXXVI.

DEATH OF GENERAL SHERIDAN.

1871 P. H. Sheridan has been mentioned too often in OUR COUNTRY in connection with deeds of gallantry and patriotism, to need more than the record of his name to call up his exploits. After the war he was successively in command of the Departments of the Gulf and of the Mississippi, and in 1869, when General Grant became President and General Sherman the General-in-Chief, Sheridan was raised to the rank of Lieutenant-General. In 1870 he visited Europe, and was with the German Headquarters staff at the bloody battle of Gravelotte. In 1883 he became General-in-Chief, and in 1888 the full rank of General was restored by Congress for him and during his lifetime. He did not long survive the granting of this honor, as he died on the fifth of August, in his fifty-seventh year.

Mention has been made of the frequent use of the veto by the President, to kill the system of private bills for pensions. In February, 1887, another bill was returned by him. This was the so-called Dependent Pension Bill, the purport of which can be seen by his message:

"I herewith return, without my approval, House bill No. 10,457, entitled 'An act for the relief of dependent parents and honorably-discharged soldiers and sailors who are now disabled and dependent upon their own labor for support.' This is the first general bill that has been sanctioned by the Congress since the close of the late Civil War, permitting a pension to the soldiers and sailors who served in that war, upon the ground of service and present disability alone, and in the entire absence of any injuries received by the casualties or incidents of such service."

In President Cleveland's first message he had spoken about the Indians. "The most intricate and difficult subject in charge of this department is the treatment and management of the Indians. I am satisfied that some progress may be noted in their condition as a result of a prudent administration of the present laws and regulations for their control. But it is submitted that there is lack of a fixed purpose or policy on this subject, which should be supplied. It is useless to dilate upon the wrongs of the Indians, and as useless to indulge in the heartless belief that because their wrongs are revenged in their own atrocious manner, therefore they should be exterminated. They are within the care of our Government, and their rights are, or should be, protected from invasion by the most solemn obligations. They are, properly enough, called the wards of the Government; and it should. be borne in mind that this guardianship involves, on our part, efforts for the improvement of their condition and the enforcement of their rights. There seems to be general concurrence in the proposition that the ultimate object of their treatment should be their civilization and citizenship. Fitted by these to keep pace in the march of progress with the advanced civilization

about them, they will readily assimilate with the mass of our population, assuming the responsibilities and receiving the protection incident to this condition." One of the first steps he had to take in their defense was when war between the Apaches and Cheyennes was imminent. He dispatched General Sheridan to the spot, and that good old "Indian fighter" reported that the trouble came from the encroachments of the "cattle kings" of the West on the Indian reservations. The President at once ordered the withdrawal of the trespassers, and peremptorily refused all delay. The white men and their herds went peacefully, without any use of the military being required, and this was speedily followed by an order to remove all the fences in the Indian Territory; at the same time, steps were taken to induce the Indians to surrender some of their claims, and to adopt a mode of life more consonant with that of the dominant race.

In 1888 a bill to restrict Chinese immigration was passed, on the nonratification, by the Chinese Emperor, of a treaty that had been negotiated.

Almost one of the last acts of Congress during President Cleveland's administration, was the grant of a charter for a Nicaragua Canal. Such an enterprise was proposed in 1849 by the Atlantic and Pacific Ship Canal Company, and then transferred to the Central American Transit Company. The surveys have been going on since 1887, and the cost is estimated at $65,000,000, and before this charter was granted the scheme had been thoroughly discussed for a year.

Mr. Cleveland, after assisting at the inauguration of his successor, took up his abode in New York, and resumed his profession as a lawyer.