Note p. 468 n — INDEX.

[273] Though President Grant’s public career ended with his second administration, which had been greatly discredited, the last years of his life made a deep impression on the people at large. Soon after the close of his second term he made a journey around the world, and, wherever he went, honors were showered upon him. In China, in Germany, and in Great Britain it was especially evident that the greatness of his military career had made a profound impression. After his return, two events deeply moved the public sympathy. In the first place, he had intrusted nearly all of his moderate fortune to a banking house in New York, in whose managers he had shown an unjustifiable confidence. The bank failed so disastrously that Grant felt compelled to offer for sale the various swords that had been presented to him, as well as other important memorials of the war. These were purchased by William H. Vanderbilt for one hundred thousand dollars, and given to the nation for preservation in the Smithsonian Institution. In the second place, it became evident, in 1884 that his life was in immediate peril from an incurable disease. Fully realizing that his death was approaching, he set about the preparation of his Memoirs, in the hope that the sale of the work would aid in furnishing support for the dependent members of his family. Though tortured by excruciating pain, he pushed on the work in the most heroic manner and was able to complete it just before his death, in July, 1885. The great merits of these two volumes secured for them an instant public reception, and the heroism and the pathos of the great soldier’s last days very deeply touched the popular heart.