To Gen. William E. Strong, in Chicago:

FARMINGTON AVENUE, HARTFORD.

Oct. 28, 1879.

GEN. WM. E. STRONG, CH'M, AND GENTLEMEN OF THE COMMITTEE:

I have been hoping during several weeks that it might be my good

fortune to receive an invitation to be present on that great occasion in

Chicago; but now that my desire is accomplished my business matters have

so shaped themselves as to bar me from being so far from home in the

first half of November. It is with supreme regret that I lost this

chance, for I have not had a thorough stirring up for some years, and

I judged that if I could be in the banqueting hall and see and hear

the veterans of the Army of the Tennessee at the moment that their old

commander entered the room, or rose in his place to speak, my system

would get the kind of upheaval it needs. General Grant's progress across

the continent is of the marvelous nature of the returning Napoleon's

progress from Grenoble to Paris; and as the crowning spectacle in the

one case was the meeting with the Old Guard, so, likewise, the crowning

spectacle in the other will be our great captain's meeting with his Old

Guard--and that is the very climax which I wanted to witness.

Besides, I wanted to see the General again, any way, and renew the

523

The Letters Of Mark Twain, Complete