g upon it every humiliation that malignity could
devise.

CHAPTER XVI.

RECONSTRUCTION UNDER GRANT.

Before the conventions to nominate candidates for the Presidency met in
1868, I had much intercourse with General Grant, and found him ever
modest and determined to steer clear of politics, or at least not permit
himself to be used by partisans; and I have no doubt that he was
sincere. But the Radical Satan took him up to the high places and
promised him dominion over all in view. Perhaps none but a divine being
can resist such temptation. He accepted the nomination from the
Radicals, and was elected; and though I received friendly messages from
him, I did not see him until near the close of his first administration.
As ignorant of civil government as of the characters on the Moabitish
stone, President Grant begun badly, and went from bad to worse. The
appointments to office that he made, the associates whom he gathered
around him, were astounding. All his own relatives, all his wife's
relatives, all the relatives of these relatives, to the remotest
cousinhood, were quartered on the public treasury. Never, since King
Jamie crossed the Tweed with the hungry Scotch nation at his heels, has
the like been seen; and the soul of old Newcastle, greatest of English
nepotists, must have turned green with envy. The influence of this on
the public was most disastrous. Already shortened by the war, the
standard of morality, honesty, and right was buried out of sight.

For two or three years I was much in the North, and especially in New
York, where I had dear friends. The war had afforded opportunity and
stimulated appetite for reckless speculation. Vast fortunes had been
acquired by new men, destitute of manners, taste, or principles. The
vulgar insolence of wealth held complete possession of public places and
carried by storm the citadels of society. Indeed, society disappeared.
As in the middle ages, to escape pollution, honorable men and refined
women (and there are many such in the North) fled to sanctuary and
desert, or, like early Christians in the catacombs, met secretly and in
fear. The masses sank into a condition that would disgrace Australian
natives, and lost all power of discrimination.

The Vice-President of the United States accepted bribes, and perjured
himself in vain to escape exposure. President Grant wrote him a letter
to assure him of his continued esteem and confidence, and this
Vice-President ha