Page:The Reminiscences of Carl Schurz (Volume Two).djvu/240

 “Wide-Awake” companies with their glazed capes and caps, the prototypes of the modern marching clubs of party organizations, sprang up all over the land as by magic. Brass bands, some of them very trying to musical ears, seemed to grow out of the earth. And all this was done without any official machinery, for the postmasters and revenue officers, and district attorneys and United States marshals with their retinues were on the Democratic side. The Republicans held only a few State and municipal offices hardly worth mentioning as political agencies. Nor was there much money used in stirring and keeping up the agitation. The funds at the disposal of the Republican National Committee were beggarly compared with the immense sums that nowadays flow into the war chests of such bodies. The State and local committees were generally in the same condition. In a large measure the campaign seemed to run itself. It was not necessary to drum up audiences for meetings by extraordinary tricks of advertising or of alluring attractions. The simplest notice sufficed to draw a crowd. Not seldom large gatherings were altogether extemporized. Of this I had myself some striking experiences. One afternoon, I think it was in July, I addressed a large open-air meeting of country people at a village not far from one of the larger cities in Indiana. This done, I thought it might be more comfortable for me to sleep in the hotel in town instead of the village tavern, and then take the train from there in the morning for my next appointment. I hoped to slip into the hotel unobserved and to have a quiet night. But I had reckoned without my host. When at supper, I was waited upon by the local committee, who informed me that the theater was full of people, who wanted me to speak to them. How was this? Had the meeting been regularly appointed? No; but I had been seen coming into the town, and some folks thought this was a good time for having a talk