aroused the question as to
whether it was right or wrong to have Church fairs, and the newspapers
became very fretful about it. I defended the Church fairs, because I
felt that if they were conducted on Christian principles they were the
means of an universal sociality and spiritual strength. So far as I had
been acquainted with them, they had made the Church purer, better. Some
fairs may end in a fight; they are badly managed, perhaps. A Church
fair, officered by Christian women, held within Christian hours,
conducted on Christian plans, I approved, the pastoral letter of the
Episcopal Bishops notwithstanding.

Just when we were in the midst of this religious tempest of small
finances, the will of Commodore Cornelius Vanderbilt came up in the
court for discussion. The whole world was anxious then to know if the
Vanderbilt will could be broken. After battling half a century with
diseases enough to kill ten men, Mr. Vanderbilt died, an octogenarian,
leaving over $100,000,000--$95,000,000 to his eldest son--$5,000,000 to
his wife, and the remainder to his other children and relations, with
here and there a slight recognition of some humane or religious
institution. I said then that the will could not be broken, because
$95,000,000 in this country seemed too mighty for $5,000,000. It was a
strange will, and if Mr. Vanderbilt had been his own executor of it,
without lawyers' interference, I believe it would have been different.
It suggests a comparison with George Peabody, who executed the
distribution of his property without legal talent. Peabody gave $250,000
for a library in his own town in Massachusetts, and in his will left
$10,000 to the Baltimore Institute, $20,000 to the poor of London,
$10,000 to Harvard, $150,000 to Yale, $50,000 to Salem, Massachusetts,
and $3,000,000 to the education of the people of the South in this
country. No wonder he refused a baronetcy which the Queen of England
offered him, he was a king--the king of human benefaction. That
Vanderbilt will was the seven days wonder of its time.

It made way only for the President's message issued the first week in
December, 1877. It was, in fact, Mr. Hayes's repudiation of a dishonest
measure prepared by members of Congress to pay off our national debt in
silver instead of in gold as had been promised.

The newspapers received the President's message with indifferent
opinion. "It is disappointing," said one. "As a piece of composition it
is terse and