elayed. Probably neither Webster nor
Clemens believed that the sale of any of these books would approach those
of the Grant Life, but they expected them to be large, for the Grant book
had stimulated the public taste for war literature, and anything bearing
the stamp of personal battle experience was considered literary
legal-tender.

Moreover, these features, and even the Grant book itself, seemed likely
to dwindle in importance by the side of The Life of Pope Leo XIII., who
in his old and enfeebled age had consented to the preparation of a
memoir, to be published with his sanction and blessing.--[By Bernard
O'Reilly, D.D., LL.D. "Written with the Encouragement, Approbation, and
Blessings of His Holiness the Pope."]--Clemens and Webster--every one, in
fact, who heard of the project--united in the belief that no book, with
the exception of the Holy Scripture itself or the Koran, would have a
wider acceptance than the biography of the Pope. It was agreed by good
judges--and they included Howells and Twichell and even the shrewd
general agents throughout the country--that every good Catholic would
regard such a book not only as desirable, but as absolutely necessary to
his salvation. Howells, recalling Clemens's emotions of this time,
writes:

He had no words in which to paint the magnificence of the project or
to forecast its colossal success. It would have a currency bounded
only by the number of Catholics in Christendom. It would be
translated into every language which was anywhere written or
printed; it would be circulated literally in every country of the
globe.

The formal contract for this great undertaking was signed in Rome in
April, 1886, and Webster immediately prepared to go over to consult with
his Holiness in person as to certain details, also, no doubt, for the
newspaper advertising which must result from such an interview.

It was decided to carry a handsome present to the Pope in the form of a
specially made edition of the Grant Memoirs in a rich-casket, and it was
Clemens's idea that the binding of the book should be solid gold--this to
be done by Tiffany at an estimated cost of about three thousand dollars.
In the end, however, the binding was not gold, but the handsomest that
could be designed of less precious and more appropriate materials.

Webster sailed toward the end of June, and was warmly received and highly
honored in Rome. The great figures of the Grant success had