u mean his
friends?

--Friends, indeed! Yes, like wolves are to sheep.

Is Mr. Hayes a sheep?

--The people that put him where he is, have made him sheepish enough;
but he isn't a sheep. His hide is too thick for that. He would be a
mule, _only he isn't quite big enough_.

Ah! You have a strange way of expressing yourself. But tell me, who
were his "friends" as you call them?

--The same men that "worked" Grant.

What do you mean by "working" Grant?

--Putting a pair of "blinkers" on him, and then stealing everything
they could lay their hands on; and then when they were going to be
turned out, stealing the presidency so as to get another "hack" at
the "swag."

Really, this language sounds dreadful, I don't understand it; but
I suppose you mean right.

--Mean right? I should think I do. I _am_ right. Only in talking of
thieves, I am using the language of thieves. They simply wanted to
keep their places and go on plundering the people.

Speaking about General Grant, what kind of a President was he?

--The best judge of whiskey, cigars and horses that ever stepped
into the White House.

Heavens! how dull you are! I'm not talking about whiskey and cigars,
I mean what were his gifts?

--Gifts? to whom? I never heard that he made any gifts. He took
everything offered him from a brownstone front downwards, until it
got to a bull-pup with the expressage unpaid--there he stopped.

Shall I ever get you to understand me? I mean had he any good
qualities?

--Yes; he had. He wore a padlock on his mouth, was a rattling fighter,
and stuck to his friends. In fact, he was generally bull-headed, _as
it were_.

Good enough! But these are not the qualities I am speaking of. I mean
qualities that the people look for in a President. Perhaps "sticking
to his friends" may have been one. What do you mean by that?

--What do I mean? Why, screening and protecting a set of rascals not
half as honest as nine-tenths of the men in jail for robbery.

Do you mean me to understand by screening that he did what they do
with coal, sift out the little ones and keep in the big ones?

--Not at all. There was no "sift" to Grant; he stuck to the whole
lot until the Republican party told him he must either let them go
or lose the country.

By the way, are the Republicans good people?

--Yes; just as good as any other, and a good deal better, if they
were only Democrats.

Why do you complain of them, then?

--I don't complain of