on prescribes, and generally, I might say, the
Legislature carried out my recommendations. The administration
was an economical one, and it was during this period that the entire
State debt was paid.

CHAPTER XI
GRANT

My acquaintance with General Grant began when he visited Springfield
the first time immediately after the beginning of the Civil War.
He came to Springfield with a company of soldiers raised at Galena.
General John A. Rawlins, afterwards Secretary of War under President
Grant, one of the best men whom I ever knew, and especially my
friend, was with this company. General Grant offered his services
to Governor Yates in any capacity, and the Governor requested him
to aid General Mather, then our Adjutant-General. General Grant,
having been a West Point graduate, and having served as a captain
in the regular army, rendered the Adjutant-General very material
service. On the morning I saw him in the Adjutant-General's office
at Springfield, nobody ever dreamed that this quiet, unassuming
subordinate would, in less than four years, become one of the
greatest generals in all the world's history. At the outbreak of
the war he resided at Galena, where he was in business.

He was sent by Governor Yates to muster in the various regiments,
and continued in that work until made Colonel of the Twenty-fist
Illinois Regiment. This regiment had been raised and organized by
another man, whose habits were not regular, and under whose command
the regiment had become demoralized. General Grant took the Twenty-
first Illinois on foot from Springfield into Missouri, and before
he had travelled very far with it, the men quickly learned that he
was a real commanding officer, a strict disciplinarian, and that
orders were issued to be obeyed. The regiment became one of the
best in the service.

General Grant was soon made a Brigadier-General, the first to be
commissioned from Illinois, and was sent to command at Cairo.

I became pretty well acquainted with him at Springfield, and
subsequently I visited Cairo, and found there General Grant, Governor
Oglesby, and other Illinoisans in command of regiments.

General Grant's career as a soldier is too well known to the world
to be repeated by me here. The history of his career is the history
of the Civil War. He was formally received by the people of
Springfield on two occasions: once while he was still in command
in the army; and again in 1880, after his trip aroun