y. Mark Twain
brought back a little package of those precious slips, and some of them
are still preserved. The writing is perfectly legible, and shows no
indication of a trembling hand.

On one of these slips is written:

There is much more that I could do if I was a well man. I do not
write quite as clearly as I could if well. If I could read it over
myself many little matters of anecdote and incident would suggest
themselves to me.

On another:

Have you seen any portion of the second volume? It is up to the
end, or nearly so. As much more work as I have done to-day will
finish it. I have worked faster than if I had been well. I have
used my three boys and a stenographer.

And on still another:

If I could have two weeks of strength I could improve it very much.
As I am, however, it will have to go about as it is, with
verifications by the boys and by suggestions which will enable me to
make a point clear here and there.

Certainly no campaign was ever conducted with a braver heart. As long as
his fingers could hold a pencil he continued at his task. Once he asked
if any estimate could now be made of what portion would accrue to his
family from the publication. Clemens's prompt reply, that more than one
hundred thousand sets had been sold, and that already the amount of his
share, secured by safe bonds, exceeded one hundred and fifty thousand
dollars, seemed to give him deep comfort. Clemens told him that the
country was as yet not one-third canvassed, and that without doubt there
turns would be twice as much more by the end of the year. Grant made no
further inquiry, and probably never again mentioned the subject to any
one.

When Clemens left, General Grant was sitting, fully dressed, with a shawl
about his shoulders, pencil and paper beside him. It was a picture that
would never fade from the memory. In a later memorandum he says:

I then believed he would live several months. He was still adding
little perfecting details to his book, and preface, among other
things. He was entirely through a few days later. Since then the
lack of any strong interest to employ his mind has enabled the
tedious weariness to kill him. I think his book kept him alive
several months. He was a very great man and superlatively good.

This note was made July 23, 1885, at 10 A.M., on receipt of the news that
General Grant was dead. To Henry Ward Beecher, Cl