interesting. Their critical analysis of the history and motives
of the arriving visitors would have been, if published, the most
valuable volume of "Who's Who" ever published. When President
Garfield died the whole country mourned.



IX. CHESTER A. ARTHUR

Chester A. Arthur immediately succeeded to the presidency. It
had been my good fortune to know so well all the presidents,
commencing with Mr. Lincoln, and now the occupant of the White House
was a lifelong friend.

President Arthur was a very handsome man, in the prime of life,
of superior character and intelligence, and with the perfect
manners and courtesies of a trained man of the world. A veteran
statesman who had known most of our presidents intimately and
been in Congress under many of them said, in reviewing the list
with me at the recent convention at Chicago: "Arthur was the
only gentleman I ever saw in the White House."

Of course, he did not mean exactly that. He meant that Arthur was
the only one of our presidents who came from the refined social
circles of the metropolis or from other capitals, and was past
master in all the arts and conventionalities of what is known as
"best society." He could have taken equal rank in that respect
with the Prince of Wales, who afterwards became King Edward VII.

The "hail-fellow-well-met" who had been on familiar terms with