Adam Badeau, Grant in peace: from Appomattox to Mount McGregor, a personal memoir

[156] of his own rights, was very strong. The acts I have described are evidence that he felt the importance of his position more fully than he showed. They were not known to any man about him but myself, and were never revealed by me until now.

As the time approached when Grant was to enter upon his new functions those who were expecting place or recognition at his hand became restive because he gave no intimation of his purposes. Every effort was made to obtain an insight into his plans, but without avail. He did not disclose even to Rawlins or Washburne—who had been his trusted intimates from the very beginning of his greatness—what he meant to do for or with them. Henry J. Raymond, the editor of the New York Times, was a warm, and, of course, an important supporter of Grant; he wrote to me begging for a hint of the future President's policy, so that he might be prepared to advocate it. I read the letter to Grant, but he refused to furnish any data for a reply. Horace Greeley also, I was told by those who should have known, would have been glad to be taken into Grant's confidence, although he made himself no application like Raymond's; but the same silence was preserved toward him. The country was full of comment on this reticence, and many of Grant's friends became anxious, not only those who wanted place, but others from a genuine and patriotic concern. But Grant kept every intention within his own breast down to a very few days before his inauguration.

He was led to this unusual course partly by his military habits and experience, and partly, no doubt, by a belief that his own judgment was better than that of any who could advise him. He had been used in the army to appointing commanders without consulting their wishes and to ordering movements without informing his inferiors; and he kept up the practice in civil life. Many of his Cabinet Ministers were appointed before they themselves were notified. One of them told me he felt as if he had been struck