Page:Speeches, correspondence and political papers of Carl Schurz, Volume 1.djvu/206

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172
The Writings of
[1860

now I will tell you what I received: From the National Committee, $500; from Indiana, $500; from Pennsylvania, not $800 but $600; and, aside from that, here and there small amounts for extra expenses incurred, the whole amounting to a little over $1800. My railroad fare alone throughout the campaign amounted to about $800. Counting the incidental wear and tear and occasional expenses as hotel-bills, etc., the money I received was just sufficient to keep myself at work and my family alive during the five months that I was active. Certain it is, that I could not pay off a single dollar I owed and had to depend upon the longanimity of my creditors as far as my private obligations are concerned. From what I learned during the campaign, there was hardly a speaker at work outside of his own State who did not receive more pay, on the whole, than I did. The consequence is that, instead of being able to rest as I ought to have done after the campaign, I have to start out again, in order to make, outside of my business, some money.




TO J. F. POTTER

Boston, Mass., Dec. 24, 1860.

I thank you for your letter of the 20th inst. The description you give of the condition of things is rather gloomy, but if I may judge from the telegraphic reports in to-day's papers, the force of circumstances will whip our weak brethren into line. The Crittenden resolutions voted down in the Senate committee, Lincoln standing on the Chicago platform as firm as an oak, the fire-eaters fluttering, the effect of Ben. Wade's speech upon friends and opponents,—all these are things which cannot fail to encourage even the most timid. We are looking with the intensest anxiety for the report of the Committee of