HENDRICKS, SHERMAN, BANCROFT-1884-1891 221 



ference was that his majesty knew a large part of his 

 army to be merely on paper. 



At this Mr. John Field, of Philadelphia, said that on 

 the breaking out of the Franco-Prussian War he went to 

 General Grant at Long Branch, and asked him how the 

 war was likely to turn out, to which the general answered, 

 "As I am President of the United States, I am unable to 

 answer." "But," said Field, "I am a citizen sovereign 

 and ask an opinion. " " Well, ' ' said General Grant, l i con- 

 fidentially, the Germans will beat the French thoroughly 

 and march on Paris. The French army is a mere shell." 

 This reminded me that General Grant, on my own visit 

 to him some weeks before, had foretold to me sundry diffi- 

 culties of Lord Wolseley in Egypt just as they afterward 

 occurred. 



At a dinner with Senator Morrill of Vermont I met 

 General Schenck, formerly a leading member of Congress 

 and minister to Brazil and to England. He was very in- 

 teresting in his sketches of English orators; thought 

 Bright the best, Gladstone admirable, and Sir Stafford 

 Northcote, with his everlasting hawing and humming, 

 intolerable. He gave interesting reminiscences of Tom 

 Corwin, his old preceptor, and said that Corwin's power 

 over an audience was magical. He added that he once 

 attended a public dinner in Boston, and, sitting near 

 Everett, who was the chief speaker, noticed that when the 

 waiters sought to clear the table and were about to remove 

 a bouquet containing two small flags, Everett would not 

 allow them to do it, and that later in the evening, during 

 his speech, just at the proper point, he caught up these 

 flags, as if accidentally, and waved them. He said that 

 everything with Everett and Choate seemed to be cut and 

 dried; that even the interruptions seemed prepared be- 

 forehand. 



Senator Morrill then told a story regarding Everett's 

 great speech at the opening of the Dudley Observatory 

 at Albany, which I had heard at the time of its delivery. 

 In this speech Everett said: "Last night, crossing the 



