The same year he was assaulted by a band of conspirators led by Cyrus Turner, and was dangerously wounded; Turner, however, was killed. Mr. Clay was defeated for governor of the State in 1851, joined the Free-soilers, opposed Know-nothingism, supported the candidature of Fremont in 1856 and Lincoln in 1860. Refusing the Mission to Spain, he was sent to Russia in 1861, but recalled in 1862 through Seward's intrigues. He returned to St. Petersburg in 1863, and was given the Russian Mission again by President Grant. He supported Tilden in 1876, and carried Mississippi for him by 35,000 majority, composed of whites and independent blacks. After this he retired from public life, but last year canvassed the North in favor of the Republicans as against a "solid South."

XVI.

ROBERT G. INGERSOLL.

THIS distinguished orator was born in Dresden, New York, in 1833. His parents removed to Illinois in 1845. He studied law, was called to the bar of that State, and, soon after, entered political life. He was nominated for Congress in 1860, but was defeated. Entering the army in 1862, as colonel of a cavalry regiment, he was taken prisoner by the Confederates after a short service, and exchanged. He then returned to civil life and the practice of his profession. Giving his adherence to the Republican Party, he has since acted with it, and has always been one of the most illustrious of its champions. He was made Attorney-General of Illinois in 1868. Though for years recognized as an eloquent speaker, and as one of the most brilliant political orators of the West, it was not until 1876 that his reputation as an orator won national recognition. His speech nominating Mr. Blaine for the Presidency, at the Republican Convention of 1876, was a masterpiece of eloquence, and at once placed Mr. Ingersoll among the greatest orators of the age. For a few years past he has not taken an active part in politics, owing to the demands made on his time by his professional duties and the numerous calls for his services as a lecturer. On the platform he has no superior. He is an agnostic, and attacks the established creeds of Christendom with an unsparing sarcasm, yet with a charm of style and affluence of humor that win the unstinted eulogiums of his most earnest opponents. He has a lucrative practice in Washington and is engaged in most of the

celebrated cases of the capital and at New York. Mr. Ingersoll is a man of fine presence and gracious manners, and is the center of a host of devoted personal friends.

XVII.

ABSALOM HANKS MARKLAND.

ABSALOM HANKS MARKLAND was born at Winchester, Clark County, Kentucky, February 18, 1825. His family removed to Marysville, Kentucky, in 1828, where he was educated in the preparatory schools of that place until he entered the seminary of Rand & Richeson, then one of the most favorably known educational institutions in the valley of the Mississippi. Subsequently he was a student at Augusta College, Kentucky.

In 1842 he became identified with the transportation interests on the Western lines, in which he continued until 1848, except the winter of 1843, when he taught school at Manchester, Adams County, Ohio. In 1848 he engaged in the wholesale mercantile business at Paducah, Kentucky. During the spare hours from 1842 to 1848 he read law and wrote for the press. In the fall of 1849 he went to Washington City, and was employed there as a clerk in the Indian and Pension offices, at the same time continuing his relations with the Western press. He resigned from the Pension Office in July, 1852, and commenced the practice of law. In December, 1857, at the request of the Hon. Joshua H. Jewett, chairman, and every member of the committee on Invalid Pensions of the House of Representatives, he accepted the clerkship of that committee and served in that capacity during the 35th Congress.

He was an advocate of the election of Abraham Lincoln to the Presidency, whose confidence he possessed after the inauguration of March 4, 1861, and by whom he was tendered offices of honor. He was appointed a special agent of the Post Office Department in 1861, and subsequently became the officer in charge of the mails for the Army of the Tennessee, then commanded by General Grant. As General Grant's commands were extended the army mail service was extended, until it finally all came under the charge of Col. Markland. He was commissioned a colonel on the staff of General Grant in November, 1863.*

* He was the only person besides President Abraham Lincoln and General U. S. Grant who ever had authority to pass at will through all the armies of the United States, thereby showing the confidential relations between the President, General Grant and himself.

At the close of the war he was sent to California on a mission connected with the postal service, which was accomplished with satisfactory results. He resigned from the public service in 1866 and became connected with the railroad interests of the South. He was appointed by President Grant Third Assistant Postmaster-General. He entered upon the duties of Assistant Superintendent of Railway Mail Service in July, 1869, and remained on that duty until October, 1874, since which time he has lived a retired life, by reason of a chronic ailment.

XVIII.

HON. SCHUYLER COLFAX,

EX-VICE-PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES.

SCHUYLER COLFAX, born in New York City on March 23, 1823, was grandson of the General William Colfax of the Revolutionary War who commanded Washington's Life Guard. Schuyler Colfax received a common-school education necessary for the mercantile career intended for him, but, being a diligent student and extensive reader, especially of history and political economy, he trained himself for a higher sphere in life, and, after serving as clerk in a commercial house for three or four years, removed with his widowed mother to Indiana in 1838, and studied law. They were stirring times when he entered political life, and as the party leaders, always on the lookout for talented recruits, perceived in young Colfax oratorical abilities of a high order, he did not find it difficult to obtain political preferment. He attached himself to the Whig Party, and in 1845 established the St. Joseph Valley Register, at South Bend, in the interest of the Whigs, and conducted that paper with rare ability until 1855. He was elected to the State Constitutional Convention in 1850, and, as a member of that body, opposed the clause prohibiting free colored men from settling in the State of Indiana. He was a candidate for Congress in 1851, but was defeated. He was elected in 1853 by the newly formed Republican Party, and re-elected for the six following terms. He supported Fremont for President in 1856, and in Congress made so powerful a speech on the Kansas question that it was deemed worth circulation in pamphlet form throughout the country to the number of half a million. He was made Speaker of the 38th Congress in December, 1863, was re-elected in 1865, and again

in 1867. He was nominated for Vice-President of the United States by the Republican Convention in 1868, receiving 522 votes out of a total of 650 on first ballot, and in March, 1869, was inaugurated with General Grant, and took his place as Speaker of the Senate. He stood for renomination in 1872, but was beaten by Henry Wilson of Massachusetts. Mr. Colfax was implicated in the charges of corruption brought against certain members of Congress, in 1873, in connection with the Credit Mobilier scandal, and was repeatedly examined before the Congressional Committee appointed to investigate the matter; but the Judiciary Committee of the House of Representatives brought in a report on February 24, 1874, declaring that there was no ground for his impeachment. Mr. Colfax retired from public life soon after, and died in February, 1884.

XIX.

DANIEL W. VOORHEES.

DANIEL W. VOORHEES, of Terre Haute, was born in Butler County, Ohio, on the 26th September, 1827, was graduated from the Indiana Ashbury University in 1849, studied law, and was admitted to the bar of Indiana in 1851, where he soon acquired considerable practice. He took an active part in politics, and being a good speaker and organizer, soon obtained prominence as one of the leaders of the Indiana democracy. He was appointed United States District Attorney for Indiana in 1858, which office he held until elected to the Thirty-seventh Congress. He served in the Thirty-eighth and Thirty-ninth Congresses, but was defeated for the Fortieth by his Republican opponent. Again he contested the district for the Forty-first Congress and was successful. He served in the Forty-second, was defeated for the Forty-fifth, but soon after succeeded Oliver P. Morton, Republican, as United States senator. He was subsequently elected to the Senate by the Legislature for the long term, and again in 1884, when he was mainly instrumental in carrying Indiana for the Democrats, thus securing his own seat in the Senate for another term. He has taken a prominent part in the debates in Congress during the past quarter of a century.

XX.

HON. CHARLES ANDERSON Dana,

EX-ASSISTANT SECRETARY OF WAR.

MR. DANA was born at Hillsdale, New Hampshire, on the 8th of August, 1819. He was sent to Harvard University at the age of seventeen, but, owing to an affection of the eyes, was obliged to discontinue his studies. He was one of the members of the Brooke Farm Socialistic Community, established near Boston about forty years ago, and was on the editorial staff of the Harbinger, a socialistic journal started to advocate the views of Fourier. Mr. Dana joined the staff of the Tribune under Horace Greeley in 1847, and was sent to France as correspondent of that journal at the outbreak of the revolution which drove Louis Philippe from the throne in 1848. Returning to New York, he became managing editor of the Tribune, and so continued till the close of 1861, when the famous "On to Richmond" article, followed closely by the Bull Run disaster, led to a disagreement with Horace Greeley, and Dana resigned. He was soon after appointed Assistant Secretary of War, the duties of which office he conducted with great ability. During one of the gloomy periods of the war, when Grant was rising into fame and usefulness, but was checked by red tape and misapprehension, Dana was sent to see that general and report upon him. He did so, the result being that Grant was retained in command, and increased confidence was placed in him. On the close of the war Mr. Dana was appointed editor of a new Republican paper, started in Chicago. It was not successful, however, and he returned to New York to be chosen chief editor of the Sun. This position he still holds, the Sun having become a brilliant and highly successful journal, possessing great influence throughout the country. Mr. Dana assailed General Grant very bitterly and persistently during his eight years' administration, though no one paid. him a more generous tribute when the hero was laid in his grave. Besides his work as a journalist, Mr. Dana has edited a household book of poetry, and has been associated with George Ripley as one of the editors of Appleton's American Cyclopædia. Mr. Dana is radical in his ideas, with a disposition to assist the weaker party in a struggle.