patriotism and his transcendent
successes in arms. Even those who had most deprecated his mistakes as a
civil magistrate were hardly sorry that he had been repeatedly rewarded
for his great services by the highest honor popular suffrage could
bestow. They were ready to believe, as, indeed, was true, that in most
of the things deserving reprobation he was the victim of his innocence
of selfish politics and his unwary friendships, of which baser men had
taken foul advantage. They were glad for his sake, as much as for their
own, that he was no longer President Grant, but again General Grant, a
title purely reminiscent and complimentary, for he was no longer an
officer of the army. With all his honors about him, he stood on the
common level of citizenship, as when he was a farmer in Missouri or a
tanner's clerk in Galena.

There came to him then the desire to see other lands and peoples and to
meet the renowned commanders in other wars, the actors in other
statesmanship. It was determined that he should have all the
opportunities and advantages which the national prestige could command
for its foremost unofficial representative. No other American had gone
abroad whose achievements bespoke for him so respectful a welcome among
the great. Every aid was availed of to make it apparent that our nation
expected him to be entertained as its beloved hero. He sailed from
Philadelphia on May 17, 1877, and, returning, he landed in San
Francisco September 20, 1879, having made the circuit of the globe.

Of such another progress there is no record. He visited nearly every
country of Europe, the Holy Land, Egypt, Syria, India, Burmah, China,
Siam, and Japan, being everywhere received as the guest of their rulers,
and welcomed by the chief representatives of their statesmanship, their
learning, and their social life. He was received with high courtesies by
Queen Victoria of England, President McMahon and President Grevy of
France, the emperors of Germany, Russia, and Austria, the kings of
Belgium, Italy, Holland, Sweden, and Spain, Pope Leo XIII., the Sultan
of Turkey, the Khedive of Egypt, the Duke of Wellington, Prince
Bismarck, M. Gambetta, Lord Lytton, Viceroy of India, King Thebau of
Burmah, Prince Kung of China, the Emperor of Siam, the Mikado of Japan,
and many others only less famous. With few exceptions he met under the
most favorable circumstances all persons of note in all the lands he
visited. Extraordinary pains were taken