_Wherein Captain Galligasken "talks Horse," and illustrates the
Subject with some Anecdotes from the Life of the illustrious
Soldier._
The horse is a noble animal, and it is by no means remarkable that
a bond of sympathy has been established between great men and good
horses. I have noticed that distinguished generals are always mounted
on splendid steeds--a fact of which painters and sculptors have
availed themselves in their delineations, on canvas or in marble, of
the heroes and mighty men of history. Bucephalus, the war-charger
of Alexander the Great, seems to be almost a part of the Macedonian
conqueror; Washington, in the various equestrian attitudes in which he
is presented to the admiring gaze of the people by the artist, appears
to gain power and dignity from the noble steed he rides; and scores
of lesser heroes, dismounted and detached from the horse, would, so
far as the eye is concerned, slip down from the pedestal of grandeur
to the level of common men. Though it is sometimes unfortunate that
the limner's idea of the man is better than of the horse, it will be
universally acknowledged that the gallant steed adds dignity and grace
to the hero.
Although it has not yet been the good fortune of the American people
to behold any worthy equestrian delineation of our illustrious soldier,
either on canvas or in marble, yet the popular ideal would represent
him as a sort of Centaur--half horse and half Grant. While I am by
no means willing to acknowledge that every man who "talks horse" is
necessarily a great man, it is undeniable that great military geniuses
have figured attractively and appropriately in intimate association
with this intelligent and noble animal. The inspired writers used the
horse to add grandeur and sublimity to their imagery, and St. John's
vision of Death on the Pale Horse thrills the soul by the boldness of
the equestrian attitude in which it places the grim destroyer.
The centaur which the American people idolize is not an unworthy
combination, and neither the man nor the horse loses by the
association. From the time the embryo hero could go alone--if there
ever was a time when he could not go alone--Grant fancied the horse;
Grant loved the horse; Grant conquered the horse.
Bucephalus was offered for sale to Philip by a Thessalian horse-jockey.
He was a glorious horse, but neither groom nor courtier could handle
him. So fierce was his untamed will, that the king ordered the jockey
to take him away; but Alexander, grieved at the thought of losing so
fine a steed, remonstrated with his father, who promised to buy him if
his son would ride him. Alexander did ride him, and the horse became
his war-charger in all his campaigns.
In his early and intimate association with the horse, young Grant
exhibited the force of his immense will, even more effectively than
his Macedonian prototype.
When children of seven "talk horse," they do so at a respectful
distance from the object of their admiration, with a lively
consciousness that the animal has teeth and heels. At this age Grant
demonstrated his enterprise by operating with a three-year-old colt.
I do not profess to be a great man, as I have before had occasion to
remark, or to possess any of the elements of greatness; but I do like
a horse, while I am free to say I should as soon think of teaching an
African lion to dance a hornpipe as to meddle with a three-year-old
colt. However good-natured the creature may be, he has an innate
independence of character, which makes him restive, and even vicious,
under restraint. I never break colts.
Georgetown, where we lived in those early days, was about seven miles
from the Ohio. One day Grant's father went to Ripley, a small town on
the river, and remained there all day. The juvenile centaur had an
idea on that occasion, which for a seven-year-old, may be regarded
as an emphatically brilliant one. On the place was a three-year-old
colt, which had been used under the saddle, but never attached to a
vehicle of any kind. It required some confidence on the part of the
youth to think of harnessing this unbroken animal; yet he not only
conceived the idea, but actually carried it out. He put the collar on
the three-year-old for the first time, attached him to a sled, and
hauled wood with him all day. At eight years of age he was the regular
teamster on his father's place. At ten he used to drive a span of
horses to Cincinnati, forty miles distant, and return with a freight of
passengers, but with no adult to direct or control him.
The pony trick at the circuses which travel over the country is not a
new thing; and when a call was made for a boy to ride the fractious
little beast, trained to throw the daring youngster who had the
hardihood to mount him, for the amusement of the gaping crowd, Ulysses
used to be a regular volunteer. I never offered my services, because I
had a proper respect for the unity of my corporeal frame. Grant, bent
on overcoming some new obstacle, was always on hand, and always as sure
to succeed as he was to undertake any difficult feat.
On one occasion a peculiarly vicious little rascal of a pony was
attached to one of these shows which exhibited in our town. Grant, as
usual, was the only youngster who had the pluck to venture upon the
difficult feat of riding him. He mounted the little villain, and away
he darted with the speed of the lightning, resorting to all manner of
mean tricks to dismount his bold rider. Round the ring he whirled,
flying rather than running, and increasing his efforts to unhorse
the determined youth, who sat as steadily as though he had been the
veritable, instead of the figurative, Centaur. Grant carried too many
guns for that pony.
A large monkey, included in the programme of the performance, was
next let loose, to assist in dismounting the rider. The little demon
sprang up behind the volunteer equestrian, and away dashed the pony at
redoubled speed. The intelligent but excited audience shouted with
laughter, but the youth was unmoved either by the pony, the monkey,
or the storming applause of the crowd. He could neither be bullied
nor coaxed from his position. Then the gentlemanly master of the ring
caused the monkey to mount the shoulders of the intrepid youngster, and
hold on at his hair. Away went the pony once more, and a new effort was
made to throw the unconquered young horseman. The crowd shouted and
roared with renewed energy as the scene became more ludicrous and more
exciting; but Grant's nerves were still steady, and his face still wore
its resolute, unmoved expression. As usual with those who attempt to
throw him, somebody besides Grant had to give in. He was too much for
pony, monkey, and ring-master combined.
I am well aware that I am enthusiastic; I have made full confession
of my enthusiasm, and I am not ashamed of it; but I cannot help
regarding this exciting incident as a type of events in the subsequent
career of that bold rider. When he mounted the pony to ride into Fort
Donelson, he was not to be shaken from his seat; he went in. That
same pony--after all sorts of vicious attempts to pitch him into the
Mississippi, or heave him over into the swamps--carried him safely
into Vicksburg, after almost as many turns around the ring and the
ring-master--one Pemberton on this occasion--as in the circus at
Georgetown.
On a still larger scale, with one Jefferson Davis as ring-master, he
was induced to mount the emblematic pony of the army of the Potomac,
an exceedingly well-trained steed, which, however, had succeeded in
throwing all his previous riders. Little Mac went round the ring very
handsomely, and so far as the pony was concerned, proved himself to be
master of the situation; but the monkey, which, in this case, appeared
to be his personal reputation, too dear to be risked upon any issue
short of absolute certainty, was too much for him, and he was unhorsed.
His immediate successors held on well for a brief period; but the
monkey of jealousy, insubordination, or vanity, very soon gave them a
wretched tumble, even before the crowd had ceased to applaud.
Grant had ridden too many horses to be overwhelmed by this pony. The
ring-master kept his eye on the daring rider, expecting soon to see him
pitched off by the pony, with the assistance of the monkey. He started
from the Wilderness one day, and every device was used to unseat him;
but he did not move a muscle when the ring-master cracked his whip, or
even when the monkey perched upon his shoulders. He fought it out on
_that_ line, and brought up at Appomattox Court House. The ring-master
gave up, and closed the performance.
Doubtless Grant would have made a capital circus-rider, for he appears
to have had a taste for daring feats with horses. At five years of age
he began to stand up on the bare backs of the horses as he rode them
to water to the White Oak River. When he was nine, he would stand on
one foot, with the horse at the top of his speed, only holding on by
the rein. A neighbor's boy was unfortunately killed in his attempts to
keep up with him, though he did not seek to imitate him in his circus
proclivities by standing on the back of the animal.
Grant was a perfect breaker of horses, for the independent, self-willed
creature soon learned that he had a master in the youth; but he would
do this kind of business only for his own amusement. He appears to have
had an instinctive nobility of character, which would not assimilate
with anything like the horse-jockey or the horse-trainer. Though he
had a remarkable tact, in his boyhood, for teaching a horse to pace,
he regarded it as degrading to follow the art as a calling. While he
was always willing to work, and had a just regard for the dignity of
labor, he was sensitive about engaging in anything of doubtful utility
or questionable respectability. A trick was resorted to by his father
to induce him to teach a neighbor's horse to pace: though, in a ride
of thirteen miles and back, he accomplished the feat, and returned
the animal to the owner a perfect pacer, he discovered the subterfuge
of which he had been made the victim, and he would never again train
another.
At the age of twelve the embryo hero was very small in stature, but he
seems to have indulged in big ideas even then. Mr. Grant had a contract
to build the Brown County jail, and the little fellow promised to haul
all the logs of which the structure was to be composed, if his father
would buy a certain large-sized horse, to which the youth had taken a
fancy. His father assented, but did not suppose the boy would be able
to endure the fatigue for more than a week, and hired a man to take his
place when he was worn out. But he did not wear out; he had a habit of
never wearing out, for he imparted the firmness and solidity of his
will to his slight frame. The hired man followed the team for a few
days, and then declared that the boy was more competent than himself to
handle the big horse.
That hired man reminds me of a certain general who followed Grant
around for a time, ready to take his place, or give it to another,
thinking the "big horse" was too much for his subordinate to manage,
and who finally took the field in person; but he was obliged to
acknowledge in the end, as the other hired man had, that Grant could
handle the "big horse" better than he could.
For some reason the men who were hewing the logs in the woods for the
jail did not go to work as usual one day, and there was no one to load
the timber for the enterprising youth. There was only the alternative
of returning to town without any logs, or of loading them himself. The
latter expedient would have been sufficiently impossible to deter an
ordinary boy from attempting the task. The sticks were very large and
heavy, and even the gang of men used levers and handspikes in loading
them. But here was Grant standing before Donelson or Vicksburg, with
this team,--before the logs, I should say,--and he had either to
do a miracle or return logless to his father. If there had been no
particular difficulty in the undertaking, perhaps he would not have
felt compelled to do it; as it was, he felt obliged to do it, if only
as an illustration of his character.
A tree had been felled on the spot, the trunk resting on the branches,
and the butt on the ground, forming a convenient inclined plane. The
big horse was hitched to the end of the timbers, and three of them
were successively "snaked" up on the trunk of the fallen tree, till
their ends were high enough to permit the wagon to be backed under
them. Taking a long chain, so as to enable the horse to work beyond the
vehicle, he whipped the end of it around each stick in turn, and hauled
it into the wagon, harnessed up again, and drove to the site of the
jail.
I maintain that this was a great achievement for a boy of twelve, very
small at that; and the people in the neighborhood talked about it as
such, just as they did, years after, about the capture of Vicksburg.
The youth had a great deal of engineering skill, and a quickness of
perception which enabled him to profit by every favorable circumstance
within his reach--a faculty which has contributed in no small degree
to his success as a great commander. He was a boy of expedients. The
accident of that felled tree, prompt as he was to profit by it, was by
no means essential to his success. It was certainly wise to use the
inclined plane, which he found ready for service; but if it had not
been there, Grant would have made one, or loaded the logs in some other
way. He would no more have gone off without them than he would have
returned from Vicksburg or Richmond without capturing the city.
There is a sort of _unexpectedness_ about Grant, which he began to
develop as a boy. He does just what the beholder does not anticipate,
surprises by sticking to anything, when, according to ordinary rules,
one ought to give up, or confounds by a course of action hitherto
unheard of. He holds on to the pony when he ought to be thrown; he
comes home with a load of logs when he ought to have come home empty;
he accomplishes many a feat in which he ought to have failed, according
to the every-day rules of life. He was fond of playing marbles, which
seems to be the only strictly boys' amusement in which he indulged.
He bet half a dozen marbles with a school-mate that he would jump
twenty-five feet at a single leap, selecting his own ground for the
feat. If I had been there, I should have taken that bet, for it seemed
as impossible for a little fellow like him to do it, as it did to
capture Vicksburg.
Grant went to a perpendicular bluff, having the requisite height, and
jumped down at one leap,--for if the terms of the wager had required
it, it would hardly have been convenient to make two leaps of it.
Though he went down to his middle in the mud below, he won the bet.
Doubtless he came out of the slough rather the worse for the leap, so
far as personal appearance was concerned, but his plight only assures
us that he looked before he leaped, as he always did, for hard pan, or
a solid rock, might have been trying even to his nerves, in a jump of
twenty-five feet.
In my opinion Lee was as much astonished to see Grant on the south side
of Richmond as the boy with whom he made the bet was to see him jump
perpendicularly instead of horizontally.