McCormick was a most hearty and hospitable man. He was an ideal person for such a life-work--the abolition of famine. He was fond of food and plenty of it. He loved to see a big table heaped with food. The idea of hunger was intolerable to him. He might well have been posing for a statue of the deity of Plenty, as he squared himself around to the long, family dinner-table, with his napkin worn high and caught at his shoulders by a white silk band that went around his neck, and with a complacent, "Now, then," plunged the carving-fork into a crisp and fragrant fowl that lay on the platter in front of him. The fact that McCormick seldom made a social call was not due to his own choosing, but because of the many worries and compulsions of his life. Once, when confiding in an intimate friend, he said, "It pains me very much to think how little I am known by my neighbors, but I seem to be always too busy to meet them." He was not at all, as many have thought because of his strenuous life, a man of harsh and rough exterior. There was nothing rough about him except his strength. He was irreproachable in dress and personal appearance. He did not drink, smoke, nor swear. And his manners and language, on formal occasions, were those of a dignified gentleman of the old school--a Calhoun, or a Van Buren. He was not a hard-natured man, except when he was battling for his rights and his principles. He would often turn from an overwhelming mass of business to play with one of his children. He was as ready to forgive as he was to fight. He never cherished resentments or personal grudges. He knew that life was a conflict of interests and policies; and when he forgave, his forgiveness was free and full, and not a formal ceremony. It was as honest and as spontaneous as his wrath. He was one of the few men who could freely pray, "Forgive us our trespasses as we forgive those who trespass against us." His fame and honors and intimacies with people of rank never made him less democratic in his sympathies. He always had a profound respect for the man or woman who did useful work, if the work was done well. Once, when a poor woman went to him for advice about some trifling thing that she had invented, he turned from his work and explained to her, with the utmost patience and courtesy, the things that she wished to know. With his trusted employees, too, he was usually kindly and sometimes jovial. "I had only one brush with him in thirty-five years," said one of his cashiers. "The last time that I saw him, he met me on the street and said, 'Hello, Sellick, have you got lots of money? Can you give me a hundred thousand dollars to-day?' 'Yes, sir,' I answered. 'Well, I'm glad I don't need it,' he said with a laugh."