The Intellectual Character of President Grant

THE intellectual calibre and character of the chief magistrate are matters that concern every man in the country. Under our form of government, the President, combining as he does the principal functions of sovereign and of prime minister, possesses greater power than any constitutional monarch in Europe ; and even the autocrats of France and Russia hardly exert more influence than the head of this nation while his administration lasts. Despite, then, the fact that our institutions are in reality both democratic and republican, the personal peculiarities of the President become of vast importance to his countrymen. And not his moral qualities alone ; for however excellent and honest, however energetic, self-reliant, and industrious he may be, he must also, as the chief of a great nation possess a great intellect. Without this, his energy may be misdirected, his self-will become mulish obstinacy, his industry be thrown away; or, with all the honesty and purity in the world, he may come under the dominion of more vigorous intellects, and so the real meaning of an election may be as little known after an inauguration, as if that election had never occurred.

The moral traits of U. S. Grant are tolerably well understood by the country, and a belief in them undoubtedly did very much towards elevating him to power; but there still exists in some quarters a mistrust of his intellectual ability, an uncertainty as to whether he possesses the faculties necessary in a statesman, especially at so delicate and dangerous a crisis as that through which this nation is passing. The characteristic reserve of the man, his persistent shrinking from self-assertion, his sedulous avoidance of display of any sort, have contributed to this anxiety. For Americans, of all people, are least used to this reserve. The man who asserts himself gets credit with us, at least for a while, and he who never thrusts himself forward, who hardly assumes the place to which he is entitled, much less pretends to favor beyond his deserts, is very apt to be taken at his own estimate, and find no one ready to drag him out of obscurity. Unless one proclaims, “I am a great man ! ” the world is sometimes a long while in finding out whether he really is great or not.

We propose a somewhat careful analysis of Grant’s most prominent intellectual traits, for the sake of discovering whether he possesses those peculiar faculties which alone can guide and govern the country successfully during the next four years. It is difficult, however, in any case, to draw the line between the moral and the intellectual peculiarities, to say where the former end and the latter begin, what is exclusively will and what is exclusively intellect. The physiologists have not yet determined whether the brain is a mass of mere matter, or the seat of the soul; the psychologists are uncertain about the influences of temperament; the philosophers differ when they attempt to map out the various and delicate divisions of character ; one trait runs into another so subtilely that it is difficult, if not impossible, always to trace the line of demarcation. This is especially true in the case of Grant. In him the moral peculiarities are so strongly developed, that to a casual observer they overshadow the intellectual traits ; and they undoubtedly affect and modify them. We shall, therefore, not attempt invariably to discriminate, but, while bestowing more attention upon the peculiarities which absolutely belong to the domain of the intellect, shall not hesitate to touch upon those that lie even beyond the boundary line.

It may, therefore, perhaps, be better to begin our discussion with a consideration of the qualities which are most readily affected by the will, and from these proceed by degrees to the purely intellectual. Any one who should attempt a portrait of the new President would assuredly begin by speaking of his firmness, his simplicity, his patience, his energy, and probably of his magnanimity and integrity. Doubtless all these qualities originate in character, considered as distinct from intellect; doubtless Grant might possess all these without any extraordinary intellectual powers ; but it would be extraordinary if he did. Nature does not often bestow such an array of moral traits upon a man, without adding some corresponding intellectual gifts. He who should display these characteristics strongly marked would be an extraordinary person, in any event, and almost certain to employ even moderate talents unusually well. It is, however, far more natural to suppose that such traits themselves are in some degree the result of intellectual qualities; that firmness proceeds in a measure from clearness of judgment, that simplicity originates in wisdom, that patience is far-sightedness, that magnanimity results from a wide view of affairs, that courage comes from the consciousness of power. These certainly are fair deductions, especially if we can ascertain that all the intellectual qualities, on which the moral ones may be said to be based, are exemplified in an equally remarkable degree.

Let us examine into this. Let us see when these traits in Grant have been most conspicuous, and ascertain whether it is probable that they were then mere exertions of will, unconscious displays of character, and not, in truth, absolute efforts of intellect. Grant’s firmness, it is notorious, is always conspicuous in the shock of battle, where, as events multiply, he becomes more determined, until, at the crisis of the fight, when things look blackest, he is most resolute, and selects that moment for some extraordinary and crowning effort by which to secure what he has been all along aiming at. Now this is either a bull-dog tenacity, a sheer incapacity for perceiving or appreciating danger, or such an absolute clearness of judgment, and such an ability to detect the critical moment, to comprehend and control all the conflicting and confusing circumstances, as amount to talent of the highest order. We all saw, during the late war, how often it happened, that men who possessed undoubted personal courage, and in calmer moments displayed a tolerable judgment, became confused in the emergency, or lost their presence of mind entirely on the battle-field. While they acted as subordinates they were successful ; they would carry out the orders of a superior at every hazard; but give them a supreme or an independent command, and they shrank from responsibility, or were overwhelmed by it. Commanders vacillated and delayed and failed, not for lack of courage, but for lack of just that sort of firmness which depends on clearness of judgment, — on a certainty that you are doing the right thing, and that nothing better can be done, — and which therefore never allows its possessor to waver in his intentions, or suspend his efforts.

This firmness it was that impressed Sherman so at Shiloh, when, at the darkest moment of the fight, — four o'clock on that first terrible day, before Buell’s troops had crossed the river, — Grant ordered an attack to be made on the morrow, at dawn. Through this same firmness he held out at the Wilderness. Late on the 6th of May, after two days’ fighting in that tangled and gloomy thicket, — where the troops, unable to see the enemy, sometimes fired upon their own comrades, — while Hancock was making his prodigious effort on the left of the national line, which, if unsuccessful, would have been defeat for the army, — Grant was on a knoll in the rear of the centre of the field. Nothing could be seen of the battle, although it was so near; a heavy cloud of smoke hung over the woods, making the air oppressive, and the roar of musketry was like incessant thunder. Meade and Grant were pacing back and forth under the trees, sometimes talking to each other, sometimes looking at their maps, while the subordinate officers stood near, ready to mount at a moment’s warning. Once in a while a cannon-ball fell, almost unnoticed, near the group. Suddenly an aide-de-camp rode up in great haste from the front, and announced, all out of breath, that Hancock had been driven in, and absolutely cut to pieces. This was the turning-point of the battle of the Wilderness ; one officer actually burst into tears ; Meade looked very black ; but Grant simply remarked, “ I don’t believe it,” and went on whittling a stick which he had carried during the day. Was this mere dogged obstinacy? Or was it simply such an acquaintance with the condition of the battle, and such a judgment based on the qualities which Hancock and his command had already displayed, as made him certain of the falsity of the intelligence ? Instead of withdrawing Hancock at once from his exposed situation, Grant sent him reinforcements, and waited for the issue. He was sure that if a momentary check had occurred, it would soon be remedied. He did not believe that Hancock had been defeated. And so it proved. The Rebels pushed the left hard ; indeed, they drove it for awhile ; but Hancock finally rallied his sturdy veterans, and drove Longstreet in his turn.

Again : that long persistency of Grant’s, while he lay in the weary trenches around Petersburg, enduring not only the dangers and trials of war, but the hostile clamors of the impatient North, and refusing to accept Halleck’s advice when Early appeared before Washington, and the former chief of the army urged that Grant should abandon his campaign, and return to save the capital, — was this a purely physical trait, dependent solely on nerve or temperament ? Or did his resolution proceed from the well-poised judgment of a man that could be disturbed by no events, confused by no tumult, swayed by no representations, because all the while he saw success in the future, through clouds that hid it from the rest of the world ?

Take, again, the firmness manifested by Grant in his long contest with Andrew Johnson ; his persistent silence under the strongest provocation to speak ; his reticence during the Presidential campaign. In all these instances he went counter to the advice of many who considered themselves wise, and on whose fidelity he himself reposed; — in all these instances, the event proved his judgment correct, and his course the best possible under the circumstances. Is it probable that this remarkable and constant clearness of judgment was an accident, and that the firmness had no relation to the judgment, but was a characteristic which would have been just as fully displayed had the judgment been wavering or incorrect ? Those who know Grant intimately say that his firmness is not exerted in trivial matters ; that he is indifferent about many little things , that he yields to others often, when it is unimportant whether he yields or not. He does, it is said, what his wife or his children wish ; he complies with the suggestions or invitations of his friends, reserving his indomitable firmness for the occasions when principle is involved, or great interests are at stake. A merely obstinate man would display his obstinacy just as often on petty occasions as on great ones. Andrew Johnson has, perhaps, as much firmness as Grant, but it is a quality which in him is combined with uncommonly bad judgment. He shuts his eyes, and rushes on headlong. He is firm because he does not see or appreciate the difficulties in his way. Grant is firm, although he sees them, because he sees also how to overcome or remove them.

Another well-known peculiarity of Grant is his simplicity of language and behavior. He says the most remarkable things in the fewest words ; he performs the most extraordinary acts amid unfamiliar scenes, in the plainest manner. He avoids pomp and show ; his conduct is invariably free from ostentation or the appearance of conceit. Now it is easy to say that this all results from the habits of his early life ; or that he is silent, because he has nothing to say ; that he is quiet in manner, because he cannot be grand. Yet every one admits that the finest breeding is that which is least conspicuous ; that the highest excellence in speech is terse simplicity. Because a man is modest and simple by nature, it will hardly do to deny him credit for being so. It is quite possible that he continues so purposely. To be simple as a second lieutenant, or as a leatherdealer, is one thing ; to be simple as general of a million of soldiers, or as President of the United States, is quite another. Most men, whatever their natural unaffectedness, would find it extremely difficult to retain the quality at the extraordinary elevation which Grant has reached. The simplicity he has been able to preserve, under his honors, may fairly be regarded as indicating a well-balanced mind, such as few possess, a judgment of men and a self-knowledge which can result only from superior intelligence.

Then, the magnanimity by which he has been characterized is easily resolved into the broadest statesmanship. It will be found always to have been exercised with a purpose, and not to be merely the instinct of a noble nature. At Donelson, where he allowed the Rebel officers to retain their side-arms after the surrender, it was with the hope that such treatment would convince them that the government entertained no personal animosity, no desire to humiliate unnecessarily those with whom it was fighting ; for at that time Grant was not without the hope of a speedy termination of the war. At Vicksburg, he paroled the garrison of over thirty thousand soldiers, — for which he was promptly rebuked by Halleck. But this was done with a deliberate purpose. He hoped that, by spreading this vast number of dispirited men over the interior of the rebellious region, he would be able to demoralize those who yet remained unconquered. He treated them well, fed them with better food than they had known for months, and then turned them loose, to scatter discontent throughout the treasonable mass.

In the most famous instance of his magnanimity, — the terms accorded to Lee at Appomattox Court House,— there can be traced a far-seeing statesmanship. The Rebels expected nothing ; they were completely at the mercy of Grant. Lee had been out-marched, out-generalled, out-fought, surrounded. He had been pursued from Petersburg, by night as well as by day, with remorseless energy; now a blow was dealt him on one flank, now on the other; now his trains were destroyed; now he was compelled to halt and face about to meet his conqueror; till, bruised and mangled and beaten down, he stopped at last in the Valley of the Appomattox, a hundred miles from Richmond. Here he found that he not only had an army in his rear, cutting off all return, but that a portion of Grant’s infantry had absolutely outmarched his own soldiers hurrying forward in their eagerness to escape. Directly in his front were Sheridan, Ord, and Griffin, while the mass of Meade’s army was close in rear. He was shut in on every side ; only the road leading to Lynchburg was left open to him, and that was not only impracticable for artillery, but so narrow that not half his troops could by any possibility escape. And so the army of North Virginia lay at the mercy of the conqueror. If Lee had not surrendered just when he did, his command must in a few hours have been annihilated. This, too, was the end of the war; every one felt it. A national officer said to a Rebel at Appomattox: “You speak as if this army were all that is left of the Rebellion.” “ And so it is,” said the other; “no other Confederate force will hold out a day, since we have surrendered.” And then and there, with everything in his power, Grant offered to the men who had resisted him so long the most generous terms that a conqueror ever accorded to a prostrate foe.

He met Lee in a little farm-house between the two armies, and near the front of each. The Rebel chief inquired what terms Grant meant to allow him, and the other replied that he should expect the surrender of all arms and munitions of war, but would parole the prisoners. Lee expressed great satisfaction at this, and proposed to sign the terms at once, if Grant would put them into writing. So Grant sat down, and with his own hand drew up the famous capitulation of Appomattox Court House.

There was but one officer present with Lee ; with Grant were about a dozen. The national officers looked war-worn and soiled; some of them had not undressed for a week; Grant did not even carry his sword. He had been hurriedly sent for by Sheridan a few days before, and rode off at once without any of the pomp and circumstance of glorious war. Since then he had not found time to return to his own head-quarters. But Lee was superbly dressed, with embroidered gauntlets and a costly sword. The cause of this was explained by a Rebel officer. Sheridan had burned all the enemy’s baggage train a day or two before, and even the highest officers could save only a single suit of clothes ; of course they selected the best. Thus at Appomattox the conquered were vastly better clad than the conquerors.

Grant, sitting without his sword, looked up from the table where he wrote, and saw Lee opposite, with his glittering scabbard. Up to this time no mention had been made of the side-arms of the Rebel officers, and according to the terms as Lee accepted them, the formal surrender of swords might have been exacted. But Grant now inserted the stipulation that the officers might retain their side-arms, horses, and personal property. Lee did not know this till he put on his spectacles to look at the paper, after Grant had handed it to him. He at once expressed great satisfaction, and remarked, “This will have a very good effect.” Afterwards he asked: “ How about the cavalrymen in my army. They own the horses that they ride.” Grant looked again at the paper, and replied : “ The terms do not allow them to retain their horses.” Lee then also re-examined the paper, and returning it to Grant admitted that the horses were included in the stipulation of surrender. Whereupon Grant said: “I will not change the terms of the surrender, General Lee, but I will instruct my officers who receive the paroles to allow your men to retain their horses and take them home to work their little farms.” Lee again declared that the effect of such magnanimity would be excellent.

Now the question is, whether all this generosity proceeded simply from goodness of heart, or whether it was not also the wisest and broadest statesmanship. Grant believed (as he has himself avowed) that, by giving Lee’s army such generous terms, he should make it impossible for any other Rebel force to remain in the field ; for, as soon as the troops elsewhere felt assured that after surrender they would neither be hung nor imprisoned, they would refuse to bear arms for a day. If he had thought and acted differently, the war might have lasted a year longer. More than a hundred thousand organized men were still in the field ; they could not perhaps have been kept together as an army, but they could have scattered to the mountains of North Carolina, or hidden among the swamps of the farther South ; they could have formed partisan bands, and disquieted the entire region that had been in rebellion, obliging the government to maintain large forces to subdue them, and increasing vastly the expenditure of life and treasure. All this he hoped to avert, by announcing at once that the defeated Rebels need fear nothing for life or liberty on account of any purely military acts they had committed.

And the immediate event proved the justice of his reasoning. The Rebels made haste to yield all they had fought for. They gave up slavery ; they relinquished the idea of secession ; they asked for pardon ; they had no hope of retaining their property ; many of them expected exile, and believed their old political rights forfeited. The day after Lee surrendered, every high officer of his army visited Grant to thank him for the terms he had allowed. They talked then with humility and gratitude. Lee himself had a long conversation with Grant, and spoke earnestly of his desire that the Rebellion should cease. The remaining rebel forces surrendered as rapidly as the formalities could be arranged. In two months no hostile soldier in the territory of the Union remained in arms. The rebels not only gave their paroles, but volunteered to take the oath of allegiance to the government they had sought to destroy.

That there came a change after this in their sentiments and behavior, we all know; that partisan bands, two years afterwards, were formed, that life became insecure at the South, that former Rebels were insolent and blatant once more, is notorious. But this was not the fault of Grant’s policy. Another, by misfortune, came into greater power in civil matters, and to the unwise and wicked administration of Andrew Johnson are due the results that all deplore.

For with Grant’s magnanimity there has always been united a fixed determination to secure that for which he fought. He was never lenient until the enemy was conquered ; and the records of his career will be searched in vain for evidence that he ever was willing to abandon or endanger any of the principles or results of the war. The same man who was so merciful at Vicksburg, whose clemency at Appomattox is world-renowned, gave Sheridan the famous order to lay waste the Valley of Virginia. It was from no weak-hearted amiability, no maudlin tenderness, that his lenity proceeded, but from the broadest scanning of possibilities, from wise judgment of events and men, as well as from a generous humanity. When this fact is recognized, his magnanimity, like his courage and simplicity, appears as an intellectual quality.

There are, however, other decided peculiarities of the new President which are in no way traceable to a moral origin. His insight into character, his power of controlling and directing large bodies of men, the marvellous promptness and correctness of his decisions at critical moments, his ability to clothe his thoughts in terse and apposite language, are all traits of a purely intellectual type. None of these is more universally recognized than his knowledge of character. The generals who became famous under him, who after himself did the most towards terminating the war, were all of his own selection and in great measure owed their rise to him. Sherman was under a cloud when Grant took command of all the armies ; but the first demand of the new chief was that the government should place Sherman at the head of the Western forces. Mr. Lincoln demurred ; General Halleck doubted. They thought the command too great to intrust to this soldier, untried by any such responsibilities ; but Grant insisted, and the opposition ceased. Grant, indeed, since the battle of Shiloh, where he first saw Sherman’s great qualities displayed, had never wavered in his confidence and admiration. He persisted, whenever he had the opportunity, in giving Sherman important commands ; and the result was the famous Atlanta campaign, and the never to be forgotten march to the sea. Sheridan’s name was almost unknown at the East, when Grant placed him in command of the cavalry of the Army of the Potomac. Grant declared then that Sheridan would make the most splendid cavalry officer of the war. Winchester and Five Forks, and many less famous but still brilliant fights, afterwards indorsed his judgment.

But Grant not only possesses the faculty of judging men whom he has known long and intimately, he has a keen insight into the immediate motives of mere casual acquaintances. He detects at once the object of those who strive to flatter or cajole him. Although he sits so silent, apparently unobservant, or bent only on preventing any betrayal of his own opinion, he is all the while observing closely; he is measuring the man he talks with, who perhaps at the very time considers Grant a dull and sluggish character. In a word or two he will describe a character, in the shortest sentence show an exact appreciation of motives and purposes and plans.

For he exhibits at times a rare felicity of language. His words generally come slowly, but they are always to the point, and when analyzed his speech often proves eloquent. His despatches abound in terse, significant expressions, like the response to Buckner : “ No terms other than an unconditional and immediate surrender can be accepted. I propose to move immediately upon your works.” “ I propose to fight it out on this line, if it takes all summer,” is historical. “ Let us have peace,” uttered by the head of the army, became the watchword of a party. His famous letter to Andrew Johnson on the removal of Sheridan is alive with earnestness ; and his remarks to President Lincoln, upon receiving command of the armies, are a model of chaste and manly eloquence: " Mr. President, I accept the commission with gratitude for the high honor conferred. With the aid of the noble armies that have fought on so many fields for our common country, it will be my earnest endeavor not to disappoint your expectations. I feel the full weight of the responsibilities now devolving on me ; and I know if they are met, it will be due to those armies, and above all, to the favor of that Providence which leads both nations and men.”

Take, again, the short speech he made when he received the nomination for the Presidency : “ I shall have no policy of my own to enforce against the will of the people ” ; — a sentiment full of wisdom and patriotism, and at the same time the severest possible rebuke of the President, who strove so hard to force his policy upon an unwilling people. At Galena, when his election was announced, he proclaimed : “The responsibilities of the position I feel, but accept them without fear ” ; while in his inaugural are opinions worthy to become maxims of public and international law. The truth is, that few men who call themselves orators have made better or more effective speeches than he who has made so few, who never speaks till he has something to say, but who upon due occasions always has something to say that is pertinent and forcible.

For in this thing Grant is extremely like a man of genius. His wisdom, or courage, or whatever power he possesses, never deserts him at a crisis. Then all his faculties are brighter than at any other time. In battle he is superb ; his manner is slightly intensified, but his action is neither hurried nor delayed. An officer comes up with news of immense importance. Grant turns round instantly, but composedly, and directs : “ Send Burnside to support Hancock.” “ Order Sherman to move at once on the enemy.” Information is brought that requires thirty thousand men to march in a certain direction. He gives the order at once, without consulting any one.

On the night after the battle of Five Forks, Grant sat outside of his tent, about twenty miles west of the James, waiting for news from Sheridan. Meade’s army and Ord’s stretched in front of the long lines around Petersburg, which had withstood them so long. Another flank movement was making, but thus far with little success. The weather had been miserable ; the rains were violent, the roads almost impassable ; horses and caissons and army wagons floundered in the quicksands. As far as Grant’s left stretched out, so far Lee still confronted him. Sheridan had been fighting at Dinwiddie, and Lee had reached around almost to Grant’s rear to strike at Sheridan,— had, indeed, dealt him a heavy blow. But to do this, the enemy had been obliged to divide his own force, hoping to get back before Grant could attack the broken front. Grant, however, at once sent an additional corps to the support of Sheridan, and, at nine o’clock in the evening, was waiting for details of the battle.

He sat wrapped in the soldier’s blue overcoat, which he wore in that campaign. Two or three staff officers were near, gathered round a camp-fire in the wet woods. Two had remained all day with Sheridan, so as to report to the General-in-Chief the result of the fight at the earliest moment. One of them had already returned, bringing word of success, — how complete was not yet known. Finally, the other arrived with a full report from Sheridan. He was in great excitement, having ridden hard, ten miles or more, from the field of victory. Five Forks was won.

Grant listened calmly, only now and then interrupting the officer to ask a question. When all was told, he rose, without saying a word, entered his tent, where a candle flickered on the table, invited no one to join him, but wrote a despatch in sight of the officers outside, and gave it to an orderly. Then, coming out to the fire again, he remarked, — as calmly as if he were saying, “It is a windy night,” — “I have ordered an attack all along the lines to-morrow at daybreak.” When one remembers what that meant,— how many such attacks had been made, and bow often with little result ; in what light the North had come to regard these assaults upon fortified works ; how disastrous repulse would have been at that juncture to Grant, with a part of his army ten miles away, — the promptness of the decision can be better appreciated. But Grant felt that the hour and the opportunity had arrived ; he had that intuitive sympathy with his soldiers which every great commander feels ; he knew that they must be inspired by Sheridan’s victory as much as the Rebels would be depressed ; and now was the time to take advantage of this feeling, and make the final assault. At four o’clock next day, the works of Petersburg were carried.

This promptness of decision never failed him in battle. Sudden emergencies often arose, but he was always ready for them. The famous movement at Donelson was the inspiration of a moment. Grant came upon the field when everything seemed lost; the Rebels had driven back his troops two miles. The men were raw and scattered ; they went to Grant, and told him that the Rebels had come out with haversacks, as if they meant to stay out and fight for days. Grant instantly perceived the significance of this apparently simple fact. He ordered the haversacks of several prisoners to be examined ; they were discovered to be filled. “ Then they mean to cut their way through ; they have no idea of staying here to fight us. Whichever party first attacks now will win, and the Rebels will have to be very quick if they beat me.” He ordered an immediate assault by his left, at a point where no fighting had yet occurred, and where the Rebels were unprepared. The assault succeeded, and Fort Donelson was won. This faculty of turning what looks like defeat into brilliant victory, of seizing the critical moment in a long and fierce encounter, of deciding in the thickest heat of battle, when the slightest error brings irremediable disaster, — this Grant possesses in an extraordinary degree. It is not so common as to be mere common sense.

He exercises the like faculty in civil affairs. The readiness with which he thinks the right thought at the right time has already been adverted to. He is not a fluent speaker, but when from any cause he becomes excited, his thought gets full utterance. Andrew Johnson attempted, two years ago, to drive Grant out of the country. It had become apparent that the General of the army was not a follower of the President in his reactionary course. Mr. Johnson had sought to compel Grant to order troops into Maryland immediately before a State election; but Grant’s tact and skill had defeated his purpose. Then Johnson determined to rid himself of his powerful subordinate. He foolishly hoped to find Sherman more pliable than Grant, and he knew that, if Grant were sent out of the country, Sherman would command the army. Congress was about to meet, and it was necessary to act promptly, for emergencies might arise in which the use of troops would be all important to the President’s schemes. So Grant, who, from the close of the Rebellion, had been constantly urging the President to take more decided steps to insure the evacuation of Mexico by the French troops, was approached with what it was hoped would prove a tempting bait.

The President first sounded him in conversation, saying he wished Grant to go on a diplomatic mission to Mexico, in conjunction with the minister to that country. Grant at once detected the object of the President, and declined the mission. Johnson, however, insisted, and Grant still declined, the second time in writing, although the President had only addressed him orally. After this, Grant was summoned to a Cabinet meeting, where his instructions, already printed, were read aloud by the Secretary of State, without any reference to Grant’s previous refusal. He at once, in the presence of the entire Cabinet, declared his unwillingness to leave the country on such an errand. Johnson was roused by this persistent opposition to his wish, and abruptly asked the Attorney-General whether there were any reason why Grant should not obey, — whether the General of the army could not be employed upon a diplomatic service. Grant at once started to his feet, and exclaimed : “ Mr. President, I can answer that question without appealing to the Attorney-General. I am an American citizen, have been guilty of no treason or other crime, and am eligible to any civil office to which any other American is eligible. But this is a purely civil duty to which you would assign me, and I cannot be compelled to undertake it. Any legal military order you give me, I will obey ; but this is civil, not military, and I decline the duty. No power on earth can force me to it.” The plotters were electrified and made no answer, and Grant, instead of resuming his seat, quitted the room. He was not sent to Mexico. On this occasion he spoke fluently enough, and none can fail to perceive the cogency of his utterance or the terseness of his expression. Yet he must have been unprepared. He could not have foreseen the exigency. But the same quality that so suddenly prompted the assaults on Petersburg and Donelson inspired the language and the argument that baffled the President.

The exactness with which he drew the delicate line between the civil and the military duty, in this case, reminds us of his career as Secretary of War. No statesman, no practised politician, ever entered upon a more difficult task. He had at that time avowed his disapprobation of Mr. Johnson’s policy, had shown it by acts as well as words, — acts and words completely understood by the President. He had earnestly opposed the removal of Mr. Stanton, yet he was ordered to take Mr. Stanton’s place in the Cabinet of the man whose administration of the government he heartily condemned. Many whose good opinions he most valued, and with whose politics he was in closest sympathy, disapproved his action in entering the Cabinet ; none of those who censured him most but will now admit the wisdom of his course.

He succeeded for a long while in repressing many of the President’s most violent attempts to thwart Congress and evade the law ; and was even able at the same time to extort praise from his hostile chief for the vigor of his purely administrative action. Holding the double office of General-in-Chief and Secretary of War, besides being the most popular man in the country, his power was enormous, almost rivalling that of the President; yet he came to no open rupture with Mr. Johnson, until he insisted, in conformity with law, on laying down one of his great offices. Certainly the sagacity and tact shown in all this are traits that no man of ordinary ability displays. They indicate a fineness of intellect for which unthinking observers have failed to give him credit.

He had evinced the same sagacity, the same faculty of preserving a straight and even course amid peculiar difficulties, often before. His whole behavior previous to entering on the duties of Secretary of War, and during the earlier portion of the long contest between Mr. Johnson and Congress, was such as none but a man of great political talent could have displayed. A soldier, he was plunged into the most complicated civil affairs ; a subordinate, he was made almost independent of his superior ; in a republic, he was intrusted with dictatorial power; he was directed to govern a hostile, though conquered people, and he was obliged to do this in direct opposition to the declared wishes of his legitimate commander ; he had also to deal with an ignorant race just emerging from slavery, at the close of a civil war ; he was approached by men of all parties and characters,—implored, advised, coaxed, threatened, by turns ; yet he succeeded in persuading all of his desire at least to do right ; he was able to postpone for a while the final outbreak of the quarrel between the President and Congress, to show the former the respect due to his office, and at the same time to obey the laws which compelled him to oppose the President’s policy. It is not possible that this could have been accomplished by a man possessing merely good intentions, steadiness of purpose, and excellent common sense.

But there is still another field in which all must admit that Grant has given evidence of extraordinary mental powers. This evidence is found in the great combinations of his strategy during the last year of the war. We do not speak now of the ability to handle large bodies of troops in the immediate presence of the enemy, as at Chattanooga or the Wilderness, but of the power to direct and control simultaneously many large and widely separated armies, so that all their movements tended to one end, finally achieving the most admirable and exact co-operation known in military history. When Grant himself started for Richmond, he ordered Sherman to Atlanta, ordered Banks to Mobile, Sigel into the Valley of Virginia, and Butler up the James ; and for nearly a year afterwards he supervised the operations of these different armies. During that period he sent Sherman on his famous march, renewed the effort against Mobile, watched over and reinforced Thomas in his defence of Nashville, inspired all Sheridan’s brilliant campaigns, brought Schofield by land, in the depth of winter, from Tennessee to Washington, and from Washington sent him by sea to North Carolina, to meet Sherman coming northward on his victorious journey, brought the Fort Fisher campaign to a fortunate close, sent Wilson on a career of success into the interior of Alabama, ordered Stoneman into Western Carolina, and all the while held the greatest Rebel army and leader in check, so as to insure the triumph of his own subordinates. He who is capable of administrative efforts as vast as these, is likely to prove fit for administrative functions in another sphere.

For it is the very intellectual qualities which we have seen so conspicuously displayed in the General that will be most in demand in the President. Clearness of judgment, knowledge of character, sagacity and tact in dealing with men, broad views of affairs, prompt intelligence in unexpected and pressing emergencies, ability to control numerous and vast and complicated interests, so that not only the success of each may be assured, but that each success shall directly contribute to the success of all, — if these are not the intellectual components of a character fitted to govern a great nation at a critical period, then all history is at fault.