The Palatka daily news. (Palatka, Fla.) 1884-1888, 1885-10-20
THE LITERATURE OF BATTLES.
Gen. Grart Familiar with the Plans and
Deta Is of Great Contests.

New York Herald Interview
Grant was fond of teasing people,
of giving nicknames and the like, f." re-
sumed Mr. John Russell Young Il
4 had one among the Others. l have
| heard him tease Sheridan, tease Sher-
| man, tease anybody about him. | have
| heard him gravely argue in his own
| library that Sheridan, whom he loved
like son, and whose genius he re-
garded as equal to that of Napoleon,
had never fought battle in his life,
| but had hired a couple of Herald re-
| rorters to 90 with him and write up
! imaginary battles. Sheridan would
! sit by, blushing like a woman, but
/ his presence, would 60 on to argue in
| support OF his allegation.
| There is an impression that Grant
| was not we'll skilled in the art of war,
and that what he did was done in sort
| of haphazard way; that his plans and
! actions were governed by common sense,
| but that what is known as the high art of
war was unknown to kim. L happen to
know how untrue THIS is. | remember
| in crossn, the Pacific ocean giving
Grant \ ictor Hugo's novel, Les Miser-
! ables, to read lie read it very slowly,
| almost like a man who is studying
rather than reading. For two Or three
days we did not see him except at meals.
one evening about ii O'Clock, | was
walking along the deck Just before re-
firing when Grants door-he had q
deck cabin-opened and he came out
Well he said, Il feel like walking; |
will 90 and bring some cigars. lie
came back with handful, which he di-
vided with me, and | said, DO you
like your bookf He replied, yes, very
much
II never liked to talk with Grant
about war matters, because he had
curious aversion to it; but was anxious
to know what he thought of Hugo's ac-
count of the battle of Waterloo, which is
a famous passage in his novel. So | said:
General, what do you think of the bat
tie of Waterloo, as told by Hugo" 1T is
a very fine account, he replied. Then
ho went on to detail, in the most mi
mute manner, what the battle of Water
loo meant. He went into the caliber of
the guns, the length of lines of the OPP
posing armies the troops engaged
artillery, infantry, cavalry; the tactics
On napoleon and of Wellington; what led
to the attack on Napoleon part and the
the defeat by Wellington.
L
asked him. Il think, he responded, 1T
was the finest planned battle of Ma
pOleon, the best conceived battle that I
know of, and nothing but Providence
being against him defeated him. From
this, walking up and down the deck,
Grant went on to describe all of Ma.
pOleOn's campaigns, from Marengo
down to Leipsic, speaking of each battle
in the most minute manner-the num-
Der of men engaged on either side; even
the range of their guns and the tactics
of both sides; why victory came and
why defeat came, as thoroughly
learned as problem in mathe-
MATES. Then back to the battles of
Frederick tho Great, I.euthen the cam
paigns of the Thirty Years War, back
to the campaigns of Caesar, and always
illustrating as he talked, the progress
and change in the art of war, and how
machinery, pro ectiles and improve
ments in arms had made what would be
a great victory for Napoleon almost i'm
possible now. 1t simply meant this,
that Gen Grant, with his marvellous
memory, had not forgotten his West
Point education. In addition to his
great common sense he knew the les
sons of war as completely as any gem
eral that ever lived. 1t is the only
occasion on which | ever heard Grant
speak of the art of war, because, as I
have said, it was subject to which he
had an aversion. You might have
known him for year and never learn
that he had fought q battle in his life
Statistics of Sunday Labor.
Detroit Free Press
The policy and rightfulness of Sunday
labor will awaken new interest in con
sequence of tho report of the Massachu-
sets labor bureaus investigation into
the sub ect. From this it appears that
the largest number of people employed
on sunday 900 are employed by tho
steam railroad companies the next
Il -0NA ara Sailnrs- the naNt II QnlA orc