Page:Speeches, correspondence and political papers of Carl Schurz, Volume 1.djvu/56

22 Now I have finished laying out the subdivisions and I shall begin to-morrow with the boundaries of the single lots. While I was employed in the surveying and before the land was put on the market, I had inquiries from many persons who wished to buy.

Day before yesterday, in the midst of these occupations, the news of the fall of Sebastopol reached me. You may imagine that I could no longer think of figures and that for the rest of the day my thoughts were roaming over the bloody battle-fields of the Crimea. The question, What will they do next? pursued me in a hundred different shapes, and when I took up the map and pictured to myself vividly the seat of war, I could not do otherwise than imagine myself for a few moments at the helm of affairs, deciding what I should do, were I there. Why must I sit here—a mere nonentity occupied with miserable plans for making money, although my head is full of ideas and the consciousness of inexhaustible strength—while out there momentous decisions are made and scoundrels and mediocrities crowd the world's stage? This miserably conducted war is conclusive evidence of how important it is that a storm should sweep over the earth and its wild tempestuous waves should bring new characters and talents to the surface. To be condemned to sit here and look on! To feed one's imagination on the stories of bygone times or the empty fantasies of possibilities in the future! And there is so much to do! It is fortunate for me, yes, for us both, that I possess such an inexhaustible gaiety of spirit; otherwise I should be consumed and I should break my head by running against obstructions that I know are insurmountable. Although it may seem foolish, you know that my happy fatalism keeps me up and has often been the source of resolutions and successes, and it is invaluable to me.