precise knowledge of details, and a
flexibility of mind that enabled him to adapt himself easily to
changing conditions.

[Footnote 1624: "You remember, don't you, what Orville Baker told us
about Arthur's two passions, as he heard them discussed at Sam Ward's
dinner in New York? New coats being one, he then having ordered
twenty-five from his tailor since the New Year came in."--Mrs. James
G. Blaine, _Letters_ (January 28, 1882), Vol. 1, p. 294.]

When Conkling finally wrested the Federal patronage from Fenton and
secured to himself the favour and confidence of the Grant
administration, Arthur bivouacked with the senior Senator so quietly
and discreetly that Greeley accepted his appointment as collector
without criticism. "He is a young man of fair abilities," said the
editor, "and of unimpeached private character. He has filled no such
role in public affairs as should entitle him to so important and
responsible a part, but as things go, his is an appointment of fully
average fitness and acceptability. With the man we have no difference;
with the system that made him collector we have a deadly quarrel. He
was Mr. Murphy's personal choice, and he was chosen because it is
believed he can run the machine of party politics better than any of
our great merchants."[1625]

[Footnote 1625: New York _Tribune_, November 22, 1871. See also,
_Ibid._, November 21.]

In party initiative Arthur's judgment and modesty aided him in
avoiding the repellent methods of Murphy. He did not wait for
emergencies to arise, but considering them in advance as possible
contingencies, he exercised an unobtrusive but masterful authority
when the necessity for action came. He played an honest game of
diplomacy. What others did with Machiavellian intrigue or a cynical
indifference to ways and means, he accomplished with the cards on the
table in plain view, and with motives and objects frankly disclosed.
No one ever thought his straightforward methods clumsy, or
unbusinesslike, or deficient in cleverness. In like manner he studied
the business needs of the customs service, indicating to the Secretary
of the Treasury the flagrant use of backstair wiles, and pointing out
to him ways of reform.[1626] He sought in good faith to secure
efficiency and honesty, and if he had not been pinioned as with ball
and chain to a system as old as the custom-house itself, and upon
which every political boss from DeWitt Clinton to Roscoe Conkling had
relied for a