A General Wanted--A Short War Expected--The Young Napoleon-- God's Revenge Against Slavery--The Silent Man in Galena-- "Tanning Leather"--Gen. Grant's Puritan Descent--How he Loaded the Logs--His West Point Career--Service in Mexico--Marries and Leaves the Army--Wood-Cutting, Dunning and Leather-Selling --Enlists against the Rebellion--Missouri Campaign--Paducah Campaign--Fort Donelson Campaign--Battle of Shiloh--How Grant Lost his Temper--Vicksburg Campaign--Lincoln on Grant's "Drinking"--Chattanooga--Grant's Method of Making a Speech-- Appointed Lieutenant-General--The Richmond Campaign--"Mr. Grant is a Very Obstinate Man"--Grant's Qualifications as a Ruler-- Honesty--Generosity to Subordinates--Sound Judgment of Men-- Power of Holding his Tongue--Grant's Sidewalk Platform--Talks Horse to Senator Wade--"Wants Nothing Said"--The Best Man for Next President. When the perception of our late great military crisis first came upon us, and we found ourselves engaged in an actual and real war, our first inquiry was for our General. For years and years there had been only peace talk and peace valuations in our market. There had, to be sure, been some frontier skirmishing--a campaign in Mexico, which drew off our more restless adventurers, and gave our politicians a little of a smart, martial air, in rounding their periods, and pointing their allusions. We had played war in Mexico as we read romances, and the principal interest of it was, after all, confined to our very small regular army of some twenty-five thousand men, where some got promotions in consequence of the vacancies made in this or that battle. Gen. Scott won European renown and some laurels in this country. We created an office of Lieutenant General on purpose to do him honor; but the people, after all, laughed in their sleeves, and irreverently called our national hero "Old Fuss and Feathers;" a nickname which went far to show that whatever his talents in the field might be, he had not succeeded in establishing over the body of his countrymen the ascendency which strong minds hold over weak ones. But when the hour of our trial came we had to look to him as our leader, and Gen. Scott accepted cheerfully the situation, whose reality and magnitude neither he nor we, nor any mortal living at that time, perceived, or could estimate. Seward smiled in his cabinet chair, and spoke of the affair as a little skirmish that would be over in ninety days. A battle or two, might occur, then an armistice, and then "We, Us and Company" would walk in with our red tape and circumlocution office, and tie up everything better than before. So Scott spread his maps and talked cheerfully, and the Washington cabinet congratulated one another. "This is to be my last campaign," said Scott, "and I mean it to be my best."