Page:Speeches, correspondence and political papers of Carl Schurz, Volume 4.djvu/455

Rh sorrow than devotion to great duties and the arduous pursuit of high aims.





&emsp; At the risk of appearing importunate, I address you again. I have been very much affected by what our friend Colonel Burt told me of your feeling that, after your resistance to the demands of your own party friends, you were now suspected of deceiving the people, and that too, by men upon whose support you should have been able to count. Colonel Burt seemed to think that my letter had strengthened that impression in your mind. Believe me when I say that, if I entertained such a suspicion in the faintest degree, I should certainly not have written to you at all. It is just because I have the strongest confidence in your sincerity and highly appreciate the noble stand you have taken with regard to your own party, as well as the difficulties and struggles you have had to go through, that I should grieve to see you drift into a false position which [is] likely to deprive you of the credit you deserve, and the country of many of the fruits of your endeavors.

According to Colonel Burt you had also received from my letter the impression as if I thought you had pledged yourself to communicate to the Senate the reasons for removals. I certainly did not intend to convey any such meaning. What I did mean was that your letter to Mr. Curtis was understood to contain a distinct pledge not to make any removals for mere partisan reasons; that when the performance of that pledge was questioned by persons entitled to consideration, you could not afford to use your