Full Text Archive

Full Text Archive
https://www.fulltextarchive.com
that idea--bankers, investors, customers and prospective customers. Out on the Schuylkill, the
Wissahickon, and elsewhere, were popular dining places where one could drive on Sunday. He
and Mrs. Cowperwood frequently drove out to Mrs. Seneca Davis's, to Judge Kitchen's, to the
home of Andrew Sharpless, a lawyer whom he knew, to the home of Harper Steger, his own
lawyer, and others. Cowperwood had the gift of geniality. None of these men or women
suspected the depth of his nature--he was thinking, thinking, thinking, but enjoyed life as he
went.
One of his earliest and most genuine leanings was toward paintings. He admired nature, but
somehow, without knowing why, he fancied one could best grasp it through the personality of
some interpreter, just as we gain our ideas of law and politics through individuals. Mrs.
Cowperwood cared not a whit one way or another, but she accompanied him to exhibitions,
thinking all the while that Frank was a little peculiar. He tried, because he loved her, to interest
her in these things intelligently, but while she pretended slightly, she could not really see or
care, and it was very plain that she could not.
The children took up a great deal of her time. However, Cowperwood was not troubled about
this. It struck him as delightful and exceedingly worth while that she should be so devoted. At
the same time, her lethargic manner, vague smile and her sometimes seeming indifference,
which sprang largely from a sense of absolute security, attracted him also. She was so different
from him! She took her second marriage quite as she had taken her first--a solemn fact which
contained no possibility of mental alteration. As for himself, however, he was bustling about in a
world which, financially at least, seemed all alteration--there were so many sudden and almost
unheard-of changes. He began to look at her at times, with a speculative eye--not very critically,
for he liked her--but with an attempt to weigh her personality. He had known her five years and
more now. What did he know about her? The vigor of youth--those first years--had made up for
so many things, but now that he had her safely...
There came in this period the slow approach, and finally the declaration, of war between the
North and the South, attended with so much excitement that almost all current minds were
notably colored by it. It was terrific. Then came meetings, public and stirring, and riots; the
incident of John Brown's body; the arrival of Lincoln, the great commoner, on his way from
Springfield, Illinois, to Washington via Philadelphia, to take the oath of office; the battle of Bull
Run; the battle of Vicksburg; the battle of Gettysburg, and so on. Cowperwood was only twenty-
five at the time, a cool, determined youth, who thought the slave agitation might be well founded
in human rights--no doubt was --but exceedingly dangerous to trade. He hoped the North would
win; but it might go hard with him personally and other financiers. He did not care to fight. That
seemed silly for the individual man to do. Others might--there were many poor, thin-minded, half-
baked creatures who would put themselves up to be shot; but they were only fit to be
commanded or shot down. As for him, his life was sacred to himself and his family and his
personal interests. He recalled seeing, one day, in one of the quiet side streets, as the working-
men were coming home from their work, a small enlisting squad of soldiers in blue marching
enthusiastically along, the Union flag flying, the drummers drumming, the fifes blowing, the idea
being, of course, to so impress the hitherto indifferent or wavering citizen, to exalt him to such a
pitch, that he would lose his sense of proportion, of self-interest, and, forgetting all-- wife,
parents, home, and children--and seeing only the great need of the country, fall in behind and
enlist. He saw one workingman swinging his pail, and evidently not contemplating any such
denouement to his day's work, pause, listen as the squad approached, hesitate as it drew close,
and as it passed, with a peculiar look of uncertainty or wonder in his eyes, fall in behind and
42 / 312

---