lustration: DR. TALMAGE AS CHAPLAIN OF THE THIRTEENTH REGIMENT.]

In the spring of 1888 I received the honour of being made chaplain of
the "Old Thirteenth" Regiment of the National Guard, with a commission
as captain, to succeed my old friend and fellow-worker, Henry Ward
Beecher, who had died. Although I was a very busy man I accepted it,
because I had always felt it my duty to be a part of any public-spirited
enterprise. On March 7th, 1888, before a vast assembly, the oath was
administered by Colonel Austen, and I received my commission. Memories
of my actual, though brief, sight of war, at Sharpsburg and Hagerstown,
where the hospitals were filled with wounded soldiers, mingled faintly
with the actual scene of peace and plenty around me at that moment. We
needed no epaulet then but the shoulder that is muscular, and we needed
no commanding officer but the steadiness of our own nerves. The
Thirteenth Regiment was at the height of its prosperity then; our band,
under the leadership of Fred Inness, was the best in the city. I
remembered it well because, in the parade on Decoration Day, I was on
horseback riding a somewhat unmusical horse. It was comforting, if not
strictly true, to read in the newspaper the following day that "Doctor
Talmage rides his horse with dash and skill."

The association of ideas in American life is a wonderful mixture of the
appropriate and the inappropriate. Because my church was crowded,
because I lived in a comfortable house, because I could become, on
occasions, a preacher on horseback, I was rated as a millionaire
clergyman. It was amusing to read about, but difficult to live up to.
There were many calculations in the newspapers as to my income. Some of
the more moderate figures were correct. My salary was $12,000 as pastor
of the Tabernacle, I have made over $20,000 a year from my lectures.
From the publication of my sermons my income was equal to my salary. I
received $5,000 a year as editor of a popular monthly; I sometimes wrote
an article that paid me $150 or more, and a single marriage fee was
often as high as $250. There were some royalties on my books.

We lived well, dressed comfortably; but there were many demands on me
then, as on all public men, and I needed all I could earn. I carried a
life insurance of $75,000. All this was a long way from being a Croesus
of the clergy, however. I mention these figures and facts because they
stimulate to me, as I hope they will to others,