The Cincinnati daily star. [volume] ([Cincinnati, Ohio]) 1875-1880, 1879-10-03
GENERAL GRANT AND HIS TRAVELS

most learned men OF the world goes 10
corroborate the Shakspearean maxim.
However intelligent and "well posted" a
man may be in all that books can teach,
travel serves none the less to both clarity
and amplify his ideas of men and things.
To such a person no higher qualification
can be afforded than to go and see the
countries and the peoples about which he
has read and heard so much.
Doubtless it was under this impulse of
mind, not less than to shake off the long
accumulated burden of cares that public
life in trying situations had imposed,
that prompted Gen. Grant to enter upon
and prosecute his voyage around the
world. He had experienced almost every
other condition of life; he both needed
and desired such personal observation
of the conditions of other countries to
round out his career. He acted wisely
for himself, and, as it has turned out,
well for this county, in adopting such a
course; a course of travel which he has
pursued with all the diligence and per-
tinacity characteristic of the man. And
Gen. Grant is too close an observer not
to have profted by what he raw.
The ex-President has had facilities and
opportunities for both enjoyment and i'm
provement in travel seldom accorded to
any man, never to any other man under
like circumstances, especially in his jour
ney through Asia. As of himself, he as
sumed no style of State, but set forth as
would any private gentleman on his
travels to see the world and its people.
He claimed no more than to be a private
citizen of the United States. He was no
more; and yet the prestige of his fame as
a General, and his distinction as the late
President of the Great Republic, every
where prompted nobility and royalty to
receive and entertain him with distin.
guished honors. These honors General
Grant had the good sense never to re-
quest and to never refuse.
Many other eminent men have gone
abroad The Prince of Wales, the Prince
de Joinville, the Crown Prince of Ger.
many. saw almost all the countries of the
world. But in every such case those dis
tinguished dignitaries had to carry about
with them all the paraphernalia of their
burdensome dignity. They were perpetu-
ally oppressed with their rank and the
obligations it imposed. Doubtless they
would have been glad to have stepped
out of their titular harness, and been al
allowed to 60 about and see common
things like common men. But they could
not. The maxim of all aristocracy,
"noblesse oblige," held them in restraint.
But General Grant, fortunately, while
having accorded to him voluntarily all
the privileges in travel that the most
distinguished rank could have expected
or required, felt none of it's constraints.
Though pretending to nothing more than
private citizenship in his own country,
still his eminent distinction as a citizen
of that country opened to him the doors
of royal residences from London to
Yeddo, from Berlin to Peking. The ever
guarded exclusiveness of the Courts of
China and Japan was voluntarily laid
aside for him, and the gates of theiI
imperial palaces were freely opened to
receive this private citizen of America, as
they would not have been opened to any
living monarch; for as to him, royal
etiquette need not be severe, nor could
any motive of his be distrusted.
But even more than this happened
General Grant was even taken into the
imperial counsels of China, and his
friendly Offices solicited as mediator
between that Empire and Japan, touch
ing the vexed question of the ownership
of the Loo Choo Islands. 1t may be
| SilClN AMI uCu tlldt W llU OllicI llfllE
man would Prince Kung, Regent Of the
Chinese Empire and the ablest statesman
of the Orient, have so far unbent himself
and relaxed the rigorous etiquette of that
ceremonious court, as he freely and
gracefully did to General Grant, the
fellow-countryman of Burlingame.
And passing thence to Japan, he was
received with equal freedom and friend
ship by the very distinguished and re-
markable man who now reigns as the
Mikado of that Island Empire. Here
too, he was at once taken into the roya
confidence, though all unsought by him
self. The japanese nobility wed with
each other to do him honor. The EN-.
press visits with Mrs. Grant without
restraint and without ceremony. The
Mikado himself requests to visit General
Grant for private interview. AT this
conference, held without any of the
forms Of State, the Emperor asks the Elk.
Presidents counsel touching the Loc
Choo Island question that threatens wal