the Court, written by Mr. Justice Grier, was filed on April 22, following, while Stanton was in California. It sustained the Manny patents and permitted Manny's heirs and successors to continue manufacturing reapers thereunder, in which they built up an enormous business and realized great sums of money.

justices during their consultations, saying to him: 'When the justices are examining these models you must not leave the room but remain and see that nothing happens to them, for they are costly.' Of course the old servant not only watched the models but heard all that the justices said in consultation and communicated it to Mr. Watson. More than a month before the decision was filed Mr. McCormick called upon Mr. Watson, who haw-hawed and was vociferously jolly. He already knew, through the old janitor, that he had won, while McCormick and his friends were waiting anxiously and ignorantly for the formal decision to be filed for their information. Manny had the two ablest managers in America in charge of his case-Edwin M. Stanton and Peter H. Watson. If they had been on the other side McCormick would have won, as he deserved, for he certainly was the inventor of the first successful reaping machine."

CHAPTER XII.

SECOND MARRIAGE-CALIFORNIA LAND CASES.

For more than ten years after the death of Mary, his wife, Stanton eschewed the society of women. He did indeed pay some attention in Steubenville to a woman of fine manners and accomplishments who subsequently became the wife of Dr. John C. Zachos, curator of Cooper Union, New York, and was an admirer also of Jean Davenport, the actress; but as law was his business. and its practise his courtship, nothing came of these admirations.

However, in the family of Lewis Hutchison, a man of wealth and prominence and one of Stanton's clients in Pittsburg, were two handsome daughters. One of them, Miss Ellen, a woman of queenly manners, statuesque figure, and classically beautiful face, made a profound impression upon Stanton at their first meeting. This impression drew him to the position of suitor, and in due time resulted in marriage.

"I never can forget when, in the early summer of 1856," says his faithful gardener, Alfred Taylor, "Mr. Stanton came to Steubenville from Pittsburg to arrange for his approaching second marriage. He went to two chests in the upper part of the house and got out a large number of letters written to him by Mary, his dead wife, before and after their marriage. He arranged them in a neat pile in the grate, saying he was 'required' to burn them. 'But I cannot do it, Alfred,' he said, his voice trembling and tears streaming down his cheeks; 'you light them for me, please.'

"So I put the match to the bundle, but they burned slowly, as if pleading to live. The progress of the flames was very painful to him, and as the dear messages melted away he walked back and forth wringing his hands and weeping. It was sorrowful, very sorrowful, and I turned my back so Mr. Stanton could not see that I, too, was crying."

The marriage was solemnized by Dr. Theodore Lyman, rector of Trinity Episcopal Church, in the house of the bride's father, on

June 25, 1856-a quiet and thoroughly enjoyable home wedding. The bride (born September 24, 1830) was not quite twenty-six and the groom not forty-two years of age. After a few weeks of travel, Mr. and Mrs. Stanton leased and elegantly furnished a house in Washington, on C Street, N. W., near the Metropolitan M. E. Church.

Brother attorneys pointed out that this house was but a few yards from the consultation chambers of the justices of the United States Supreme Court. That was the fact, and frequently the justices were entertained therein at dinner or as agreeable social callers.

There were strong reasons for the removal to Washington. His chief retainers grew out of matters requiring frequent appearance before the United States Supreme Court, and the nomination of James Buchanan, a Pennsylvanian and a personal friend, renewed Stanton's interest in the Democratic party, from which he had been estranged for some years. Jeremiah S. Black, as soon as the nomination of Buchanan had been accomplished, urged him. to take an open part in the Democratic campaign. This advice was followed, and, on March 4, 1857, when the Buchanan administration was installed, Stanton found himself on intimate terms with it and Attorney-General Black turning important public business into his hands. The greatest of these matters is called the California Private Land Claims, which grew out of the partition of Mexico by the treaty of 1848, and the annexation of the Pacific Coast territory to the United States. They numbered over eight hundred and covered over twenty thousand square miles of land.

In 1851 Congress enacted a law providing for a commission to hear and determine the claims of those holding real or pretended grants from Mexico, with the right of appeal by either party to the Federal courts. Under this law claimants began a grand system of forgery and perjury for the robbery of the Government, enlisting an abundance of capital and the cooperation of many public officials. Finally, the Government was startled by a favorable decision on the enormous and fraudulent claim of José y Limantour-"the most stupendous fraud," said Attorney-General Black, "since the beginning of the world." The United States district attorney of California-Colonel Della Torre-was ordered to take an appeal from the decision, and at the same time Stanton was retained to proceed to California as "special counsel of the United States" to

"do his utmost to protect the interests of the Government."

With five thousand dollars as a retainer, accompanied by Lieutenant H. N. Harrison of the navy, James Buchanan, jr. (son of the Reverend E. Y. Buchanan of Philadelphia, the President's only brother), and his own son Eddie, Stanton sailed from New York in the Star of the West, a craft made famous three years later by receivign the fire in Charleston harbor of the Confederate forts while transporting relief to the Union soldiers in Fort Sumter. Crossing the Isthmus of Panama during the prevalence of a fever epidemic, he proceeded in a continuous storm on the Pacific Ocean to San Francisco. At this time he was suffering severely with asthma, which was rendered more acute by the tempestuous voyage. In his first letter from the ocean, dated March 2, on the Caribbean Sea, to Peter H. Watson, he said:

I have not suffered a minute from seasickness, nor has Eddie. Almost every one else was sick-some very severely. The first few days out, the weather was very cold, rough, and disagreeable, which brought on a sharp attack of asthma-the hardest I have had. It lasted several days, but is gradually disappearing under the genial influence of the tropics. If I could have been seasick I think it would have relieved me, and in this respect I shall not experience one of the benefits anticipated from the voyage.

Sunday we spent at Kingston, Jamaica, where the ship takes on her coal. The scenes at the wharf and at the church-which were the two points of observation that I selected-afforded a strange and very interesting exhibition. Here the extremes of the Jamaican social system were encountered.

The products of the island have greatly diminished and the estates grown ruined and neglected since the Emancipation. The whites say this is owing to the oppressive exactions and burthens of the Government, which destroy all hope of improvement and repress all exertion. I saw no indication of unwillingness in the blacks to labor; but the complaints of want of work are very great. I had several applications by smart, active fellows to go with me, because, they said, they could get no employment; all our passengers had similar applications.

On the 10th he wrote again:

I have finished writing out my argument* in the reaper case [McCormick vs. Manny] and on my arrival at San Francisco will forward it to you. The roughness of the sea and the shaking of the ship have pre

*Stanton made his great argument in the reaper case before the United States Supreme Court wholly without notes or references. Weeks afterward, P. H. Watson requested to be supplied with a copy of it for publication, and Stanton, while on the ocean, reproduced it complete from memory.

vented its being written as well as I could wish, and it has required a good deal of correction. I think, however, that with proper care in reading the proof, no material mistakes can occur. I have also added a title page, and an explanatory note.

In the note I have left a blank for the date of the opinion of the Supreme Court and the judge by whom it is delivered. I assume that it will be in our favor.

My health is now very good. For the last three days I have had no symptom of my complaint. We are getting out of the hot latitudes. The air is delightfully cool, bracing, and luxurious to breathe. My chest and lungs feel lighter and better than for several months. Indeed I never was in more perfect health or enjoyed life better than for the last two days.

On Friday, March 19, he wrote:

The last forty-eight hours have been the roughest ever known on this coast. Night before last was terrific. The sea dashed over our hurricane deck, knocked in the ports, poured into the staterooms and frightened everybody generally.

On April 3, he wrote from San Francisco:

My health has been a good deal improved, but it is not entirely restored. As soon as I can get leisure I shall go to some of the interior valleys, where I hope to become quite well.

I spend about ten hours every day in examining and arranging Spanish documents, letters, records, etc., in the archives office, and as I often have to resort to an interpreter, the work is slow. The results, however, are more complete than I hoped for, and the investigation already made will, I think, insure complete success in the legal objects of my voyage-however it may prove on the score of health.

In his letter of April 18, he thus referred to the Spaniards:

Everything about this country-its past, present, and future-is full of interest. The examination of its early history as developed in the State papers and provincial records and official correspondence has entertained me very much-especially the Spanish period extending back from 1821 to 1787. The old Spaniards were a grand race, and their wonderful administrative talent has nothing like it at the present day.

I am in tolerable health, but not entirely restored, having overtaxed myself a little the past ten days.

On the following day he wrote this to his partner, Theo. Umb

staetter:

The climate is very pleasant, the weather uniform. The forenoon is delightful, but the sea breeze in the afternoon is chilly.