He would like to be a farmer; a "down-the-river trader," or "to get an education." It was not convenient to establish him as a tiller of the soil; and his father apparently regarded being a "down-the-river trader" as a disreputable occupation--probably as something akin to a Yankee pedler who sells wooden nutmegs; and the money it would cost to give him a liberal education could not readily be spared from the tannery, which, in former days, kept the larger portion of its capital soaking in the vats for months. But the question was a serious one, and though it could not be realized at that time, the welfare of a great nation, as well as the destiny of an unformed youth, rested upon the issue. Who shall say that an inspiration higher than his own thought did not suggest to the anxious father the idea of sending his son to West Point? It was a happy solution of the problem; and what was better still, it suited the boy "first rate." The idea was promptly followed up. Mr. Grant wrote to the Hon. Thomas L. Hamer, the representative in Congress of the district in which he resided. The letter reached the member only on the day before his term of office expired, when his right to nominate a cadet to the Military Academy would cease. Fortunately the mail was faithful to its sacred duty on this occasion, and bore the missive to its destination in season to save Grant from becoming a farmer or a "down-the-river trader," and in season to have him appointed, not alone as a cadet, but as the savior of the nation; for that nomination was the germ of the event which gave us the man that crushed the Rebellion. As I think of the condition of my country when the rising sun of Grant's genius pointed him out to the people as the only fit leader for the armies of the Union, I tremble to think of the results which must have followed a single day's delay of that momentous letter! The providential man was providentially guided to his brilliant destiny. The bugbear of an examination for admission to West Point, though it then included only reading, writing, spelling, and arithmetic to decimal fractions, had more terrors to the young aspirant for military honors than the capers of a three-year-old colt. He was not prepared by any special training for such an ordeal; and a young man, who had previously been appointed by Mr. Hamer, had twice failed to pass, his ill success keeping the place open for Grant. The opportunities of the newly-appointed cadet had been very limited, and it would hardly have been to his discredit if he had failed to come up to the requirements of the institution. But he did not fail; with all his concentrated energy of purpose guiding and strengthening him, he could not fail; and on the 1st of July, 1839, at the age of seventeen, Grant was duly admitted to the Military Academy to prepare himself for the glorious future which God and his country had in store for him. And then "The great Ulysses reached his native shore,"