carriages waiting for passengers. I said to the farmers: "Will
any of you take me up to General Garfield's residence?" One of
them answered: "We will all take you up this morning, but if you
had come yesterday you would have had to wait your turn."

It was a startling instance of the variableness of public opinion.
Delegations from everywhere, on their way to extend greetings
to the candidate, had read the morning papers and turned back,
deciding not to go.

I found Garfield struggling bravely to overcome the depression
which he felt. He was in close touch with the situation everywhere,
and discussed it with discrimination and hopefulness.

The most affecting incident occurred while I was talking with him.
His mother passed through the room and, patting him on the back,
said: "James, the neighbors think it is all right; they are raising
a banner at the corner."

Two old soldier friends came in, and the noonday dinner was a
rare intellectual feast. The general was a brilliant
conversationalist. His mind turned first to the accidents of
careers. He asked me if there was not a time in my early struggles
when if Providence had offered a modest certainty I would not
have exchanged the whole future for it, and then continued:
"There was a period in my early struggles as a teacher when, if
I had been offered the principalship of an endowed academy,
with an adequate salary, with the condition that I must devote
myself to its interests and abandon everything else, I am quite
sure I would have accepted."