WRITINGS OF SAM HOUSTON, 1857
434
and industry, and who spends his year alternately-a portion of it at an academy, or college, or country school, and the rest in toiling laboriously with his hands, to store his mind with useful and practical knowledge. He is excluded; while the man who is pampered in ease and affluence, because he has political influ- ence, is preferred in this country. It is contrary to the genius of our institutions and to the principles of liberty. I have pro- tested-I shall continue to protest against it. There was lately an accession of four regiments to the Army of the United States. Out of nearly two hundred officers ap- pointed there were some half a dozen or dozen taken from the walks of private life, and they were selected through political influence. I say every officer should have been transformed into efficient soldiers. Then was the time to exemplify a principle correct in itself, that the country is made for all ; and every man who bears a share in its defense-who toils to sustain its glory and its renown and contributes to its resources, is entitled to an equal share in its favors and its honors. 1 Cong,·essional Globe, Part 1, 1856-1857, pp. 724-725. On February 17, 1857, in committee of the whole, the Senate took up the House Resolution No. 782, which was to increase the pay of Army officers. The bill proposed that after the end of the "present fiscal year" (June, 1857), every Army officer's pay should be increased $20 per month. This raise of salary was to include military storekeepers, and rations were to be allowed at thirty cents per ration.
To MRS HousToN 1
Washington, 1st March, 1857. My Dear: After two night sessions I did not go to church today. My friend Stuart/ of Galveston has been with me up to this time since my return from breakfast. After dinner I intend to pass the evening and night in reading the Testament and Harvey's Meditations. Today is pleasant and betokens spring. When I reflect on the distance from this to where you are and our flock, I feel that I am indeed an exile, interdicted from all that is dear to me on earth. I have felt exile in other lands and from other homes, but then I was an exile that combined no wish or hope of return. In my present case, there is blended both desire and hope. Desire to be with you and hope that the day is not distant that it will be the case! Our sunny home appears to me more bright and lovely than it has ever done in the realizations of the past. So
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