The Twenty-first Illinois Infantry was a body of three months troops. In this, even more than in many other regiments, the democratic ideas of equality, so pernicious in a military organization, were prevalent to such an extent that the colonel, whose place Grant had been appointed to fill, could not manage it. Peculiar circumstances were involved in the relations of the commander and the troops; and when it is considered that the lesson of the necessity of discipline had not yet been learned, it is hardly proper to blame either party. The regiment was then in a demoralized condition, but it was composed of splendid material, and its subsequent record proves that its men were apt scholars in the school of discipline as well as in that of actual conflict. They were proud to have a regular army officer as their leader; but when he made his appearance before them, his rather rusty clothes, and plain, matter-of-fact manner, excited their ridicule. However they soon stumbled against his iron will, and promptly realized that they had a commander who had been in the habit of being obeyed, and who intended to be in the present instance. He was not a showy man, and not one who was disposed merely to play soldier. They saw that he meant fight, and meant discipline. Colonel Grant marched his regiment to Caseyville, where he drilled the men for four weeks, transforming them from a mob into one of the best disciplined bodies of troops in the country; indeed, the Twenty-first became noted for its drill and discipline. It was no easy thing at that time, when the private in the ranks regarded himself as the equal of the colonel, and was unwilling, even in his military relations, to sacrifice his own individual will,--it was no easy thing to bring order and regularity out of the chaos of equality and confusion. But Grant accomplished this, and more than this; and he did it so skilfully and adroitly that no heads were broken, and no man was persuaded into the belief that he was no longer an American citizen. Grant has been nominated to the highest office in the gift of the people--a position which will make him the peer of emperors and kings; and it is important to deduce from his record the evidence of his fitness for this splendid elevation. An iron will, unmodified by other noble traits of character, is an element of weakness rather than of strength, for a merely obstinate man at the helm of state is a discordant and dangerous element. A strong will, sustained and dignified by high aims and genuine principle, is a godlike attribute; without true principle and high aims, it reduces the man to the vilest brute level: it makes him a Nero or a Caligula.