life, and by it he attained unto a breadth of scholarship which was as remarkable as any other of his multiform endowments. To accomplish this purpose he was willing to do anything in the shape of honest labor which would bring him in the needful funds. He learned the carpenter's trade and earned some money by doing little jobs of work for the neighbors. At the age of seventeen, because he could get more wages, he made a contract to drive the mules of a canal-boat along the tow-path of the Ohio Canal, which ran but a short distance from the Garfield farm. Determined to excel in whatever he undertook, he was soon promoted from the position of driver to that of steersman, at which post he remained for about a year and a half, saving his wages, and reading and learning everything which came within his reach.

About this time it appears that Garfield thought he would branch out a little in his nautical experience and become a sailor on some of the vessels plying on Lake Erie. If he had done this, it is barely possible he might never have been the man he afterward became; at all events, a period of sickness changed his mind, and also changed the whole current of his life. Right after his recovery, he entered an academy near by, boarding himself and working at his trade to pay his way. The next season he taught a district school, and saved his wages to be expended upon a collegiate course. At the age of twenty-three he entered Williams College, at Williamstown, Mass., commencing at the Junior year on account of the extent of his previous studies. In two years he graduated, bearing away with him one of the honors

of his class. He then commenced teaching at Hiram College, and after one year was made President of the college. He was now twenty-six, had won a place for himself in the world, and accordingly married Miss Lucretia Rudolph, a lady with a character much like his own, and whose fame is now inseparably linked Iwith that of her immortal husband.

Perhaps we cannot better explain the secret of Garfield's great successes in life, of his culture, of his learning, and of his growth in statesmanship, than by quoting from one of his speeches to the students of Hiram College, delivered many years after he left the institution. The speech, or familiar talk, is worthy of reproduction, because of its philosophical value as a guide in the conduct of life, and because it affords such a clear insight to the character of the man, and shows so clearly the secret of his vast acquirements and immense power. He said :

"I was thinking, young ladies and gentlemen, as I sat here this morning, that life is almost wholly made up of margins. The bulk itself of almost anything is not what tells. That exists any way. That is expected. That is not what gives the profit or makes the distinguishing difference. The grocer cares little for the great bulk of the price of his tea. It is the few cents between the cost and selling price, which he calls the margin, that particularly interests him. Is this to be great or small, is the thing of importance. Millions of dollars change hands in our great marts of trade, just on the question of margins. This same thing is all important in the subject of thought. One mind is not greater than another, perhaps, in the great bulk of its contents; but its

margin is greater, that's all. I may know just as much as you do about the general details of a subject, but you can go just a little farther than I can. You have a greater margin than I. You can tell me of some single thought just beyond where I have gone. Your margin has got me. I must succumb to your superiority.

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'I recall a good illustration of this when I was in college. A certain young man was leading the class in Latin. I thought I was studying hard. I couldn't see how he got the start of us all so. To us he seemed to have an infinite knowledge. He knew more than we did. Finally, one day I asked him when he learned his Latin lesson. At night,' he replied. I learned mine at the same time. His window was not far from mine, and I could see him from my own. I had finished my lesson the next night as well as usual, and feeling sleepy, was about to go to bed. I happened to saunter to my window, and there I saw my classmate still bending diligently over his book. 'There's where he gets the margin on me,' I thought. But he shall not have it for once,' I resolved. I will just study a little longer than he does to-night.' So I took down my books again, and, opening to the lesson, went to work with renewed vigor. I watched for the light to go out in my classmate's room. In fifteen minutes it was all dark. There is his margin,' I thought. It was fifteen minutes more time. It was hunting out fifteen minutes more of rules and root-derivatives. How often when a lesson is well prepared, just five minutes spent in perfecting it will make one the best in his class. The margin in such a case is very small, but

it is all important. The world is made up of little things."

It was by taking account of small fractions of time, by utilizing every available five minutes, that Garfield stored his mind with a vast, inexhaustible fund of information. And to do this a rigid system became essential, and this system, in turn, so disposed every item of information that it was always subject to the call of the brain when required.

Soon after marriage Mr. Garfield's political life began. In 1859 he was elected State Senator for Portage and Summit counties in his native State. Right after this the war for the preservation of the Union broke out, and Senator Garfield at once took a prominent part in the debates which that event occasioned. The well-trained mental powers of the young man brought him at once into notice, and he soon became conspicuous among men much older than himself. From this time on his career was steadily and grandly upward. He entered the war as Lieutenant-colonel of the 42d regiment of Ohio Volunteers, but was soon promoted to its full command. Going at once into active service he showed remarkable coolness and skill in action, and was speedily given a brigade in the Army of the Cumberland. From this post he was transferred to South Carolina and made chief of staff to General Rosecrans, where his services were of a brilliant character, and highly valued. After the battle of Chickamauga, he was made a full Major-General of Volunteers for meritorious conduct.

Believing that the war would soon terminate, Gen. Garfield accepted a nomination to Congress from the Ohio Western Reserve District while in the field, and

was triumphantly elected. Resigning his position in the army, he entered the halls of legislation at Washington and never afterward left them until he was chosen the twentieth President of the United States. Of his career in Congress it is unnecessary to speak at length. Its record forms a part of the history of the country during many eventful years. He was an orator and a statesman. He rose step by step until he became the acknowledged leader of the House. A little before his nomination for the Presidency, he was chosen United States Senator from Ohio, and entered the Republican Convention at Chicago, June 2, 1880, as a delegate from the same State to vote and work in the interest of his friend, John Sherman. It is quite probable that he had never thought of his own nomination until it became evident that the Convention would fail in selecting a candidate, owing to the numerous divisions into which the party had broken up. When it was seen that some new man must be taken up, all minds and eyes turned instinctively to Gen. Garfield, and against his firm protest he was nominated on the thirty-sixth ballot. During the exciting contest which followed, he bore himself with such dignity and modesty as to win friends by every word he uttered. Then came the triumphant election, the brilliant and impressive inauguration, three months of steady service, and the assassination which resulted in a long sickness, ending in death. Never was a public man more widely honored or more sincerely mourned. The whole world seemed glad to do homage to his memory.

In summing up the salient points of his character, Lieut. Gov. Shuman, editor of the Chicago Evening