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[64] The United States, he says, are going on as if in the greatest security, “when they have not the power to resist an invasion by the fleets of fourth-rate European Powers for a time until we could prepare for them.” The United States “should have a good navy, and our sea-coast defences should be put in the finest possible condition. Neither of these cost much when it is considered where the money goes and what we get in return.” The tone and temper of his remarks on England, and on her behaviour during the war, are in honourable contrast with the angry acrimony shown by many who should have known better. He regretted, he said, the exasperation. “The hostility of England to the United States, during our rebellion, was not so much real as it was apparent. It was the hostility of the leaders of one political party. England and the United States are natural allies, and should be the best of friends.” The Memoirs stop, as I have said, in 1865, and do not embrace Grant's Presidency, his journey to Europe, his financial disaster, his painful illness and death. As to his financial disaster, I will repeat what one of Grant's best friends, a man of great business faculty and of great fortune, remarked to me. I had been
Boston. De Wolfe, Fiske &c Co. 361 and 365 Washington Street. 1888.
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