contact with him. The work is now reissued in the hope that it may
give his countrymen of the present day the benefit of the counsel, the
guidance and the inspiration that has proven so valuable in the past.

February 22nd, 1926.




PREFACE

BY THE AUTHOR


A desire to know intimately those illustrious personages, who have
performed a conspicuous part on the great theatre of the world, is,
perhaps, implanted in every human bosom. We delight to follow them
through the various critical and perilous situations in which they
have been placed, to view them in the extremes of adverse and
prosperous fortune, to trace their progress through all the
difficulties they have surmounted, and to contemplate their whole
conduct, at a time when, the power and the pomp of office having
disappeared, it may be presented to us in the simple garb of truth.

If among those exalted characters which are produced in every age,
none can have a fairer claim to the attention and recollection of
mankind than those under whose auspices great empires have been
founded, or political institutions deserving to be permanent,
established; a faithful representation of the various important events
connected with the life of the favourite son of America, cannot be