STEAMSHIPS AND SUBSIDIES 227 



hospital and other experiences were drawn upon 

 to play upon my heart strings. 



Often men high in the army were present at 

 these dinners and from them many a military and 

 political secret found their way to the press in 

 such form that their authors could technically 

 deny responsibility for the publication they had 

 eagerly sought. The correspondents were a 

 loyal lot and many a grave secret they buried, but 

 it was hard to muzzle William Swinton in mili- 

 tary matters after once giving him an opening, 

 and I recall how he annoyed General Banks by a 

 two-column display in the New York Times of 

 twice as much as the General intended to have 

 published. George Alfred Townsend filed every- 

 thing he heard in his capacious memory and up to 

 his recent death was the repository of more po- 

 litical secrets of the time of which I am writing 

 than any other man. 



It was about this time that I dined at his house 

 with Blaine, who, on Townsend's initiative, 

 talked all through the dinner and evening on his 



