CHAPTER XIX.

JOHN GRIFFIN CARLISLE.

THE present Speaker of the House of Representatives,

was born in Campbell (now Kenton) county, Kentucky, September 5, 1835. He received a common-school education, taught school in the county and afterward in Covington, and then studied law with J. W. Stevenson and W. B. Kinkead, and was admitted to the bar in March, 1858, and has practiced since. In 1859, was elected to the State House of Representatives, and served until 1862; in 1864, was nominated as a Presidential Elector on the Democratic ticket, but declined. He was elected to the State Senate in February, 1866, and re-elected in 1869. He was a delegate at large from Kentucky to the National Democratic Convention at New York, in July, 1868, and in May, 1871, was nominated for the State Senate; resigned his seat in June, 1871, and was elected Lieutenant Governor in August, serving until 1875. In 1876, he was alternate Presidential Elector for the State at large.

He was nominated for and elected to Congress, taking his seat at the commencement of the Forty-fifth Congress, re-elected to the Forty-sixth, Forty-seventh, and unanimously returned to the Forty-eighth, of which he was chosen Speaker. Mr. Carlisle is, and always has been, a Democrat; but he enjoys, to a marked degree, the respect of his political opponents. Quick in his perceptions, he is ready to act, and as a parliamentarian he has few equals, and perhaps no superior. Logical in thought, terse in speech, pleasant in address, when he rises in debate he commands attention. Kentucky has no brighter or more genial man than John G. Carlisle.

CHAPTER XX.

ROSWELL P. FLOWER.

HERE is something essentially American in the life

THE

and character of the gentleman who is the subject of this sketch. The United States has given rare opportunities to men with courage, honesty of purpose, integrity and energy to achieve success. The bulk of our public men and those who have legitimately achieved fortune, have been men with the above characteristics, and Mr. Flower is sui generis one of that stamp. He is of the people, and his success as a business and a public man has come of his devotion to right and his tenacity of purpose.

Roswell Pettabone Flower was born in Theresa, Jefferson county, New York, August 7, 1835, and is consequently not quite forty-nine years of age. He is descended from English stock, one Lamrock Flower having emigrated from that country to Connecticut, settling in Hartford in 1766. Roswell P. Flower's father, Nathan Munroe Flower, was fifth in descent from Lamrock Flower, and was a native of New York State. When Roswell was about eight years of age his father died, leaving his family poor, which compelled Roswell to labor, when not in school, to help support the family. At the early age of fourteen, he got a position in the village store at the munificent salary of $5 per month; and at sixteen, he graduated with honors from the High School in his place of residence. During the next two years he labored hard in a variety of manual employments, contented that he was the means of aiding others as well as supporting himself, and storing his mind with useful facts while so laboriously employed. At eighteen he removed to Watertown, in the same county,