tters, but I am not that
kind of a corpse. May I never be so dead as to neglect the hail of
a friend from a far land." Out of this incident grew a feature of an
anecdote related in Following the Equator the joke played by the man
from Bendigo.]--He died September 19th, and Arthur came into power.
There was a great feeling of uncertainty as to what he would do. He was
regarded as "an excellent gentleman with a weakness for his friends."
Incumbents holding appointive offices were in a state of dread.

Howells's father was consul at Toronto, and, believing his place to be
in danger, he appealed to his son. In his book Howells tells how, in
turn, he appealed to Clemens, remembering his friendship with Grant and
Grant's friendship with Arthur. He asked Clemens to write to Grant, but
Clemens would hear of nothing less than a call on the General, during
which the matter would be presented to him in person. Howells relates
how the three of them lunched together, in a little room just out of
the office, on baked beans and coffee, brought in from some near-by
restaurant:

The baked beans and coffee were of about the railroad-refreshment
quality; but eating them with Grant was like sitting down to baked
beans and coffee with Julius Caesar, or Alexander, or some other
great Plutarchan captain.

Clemens, also recalling the interview, once added some interesting
details:

"I asked Grant if he wouldn't write a word on a card which Howells could
carry to Washington and hand to the President. But, as usual, General
Grant was his natural self--that is to say, ready and determined to do
a great deal more for you than you could possibly ask him to do. He
said he was going to Washington in a couple of days to dine with the
President, and he would speak to him himself on the subject and make it
a personal matter. Grant was in the humor to talk--he was always in a
humor to talk when no strangers were present--he forced us to stay and
take luncheon in a private room, and continued to talk all the time.
It was baked beans, but how 'he sits and towers,' Howells said, quoting
Dame. Grant remembered 'Squibob' Derby (John Phoenix) at West Point
very well. He said that Derby was always drawing caricatures of the
professors and playing jokes on every body. He told a thing which I
had heard before but had never seen in print. A professor questioning a
class concerning certain particulars of a possible siege said, 'Suppose
a thousa