Webster conceived the idea that he had discovered me to the world, but he was reasonably modest about it. He did much less cackling over his egg than Webb and Bliss had done.

“DoⒶtextual note you know General Grant has actually determined to write his Memoirs and publish them?Ⓐtextual note He has said so, to-day, in so many words.”Ⓐtextual note

That was all I heard—just those words—and I thought it great good luck that I was permitted to overhear themⒺexplanatory note.

In the morning I went out and called on General Grant. I found him in his library with ColonelⒶtextual note Fred Grant, his son. The General said, in substance, this:

“SitⒶtextual note down and keep quiet until I sign a contract”—and added that it was for a book which he was going to write.

Fred Grant was apparently conducting a final reading and examination of the contract, to himself. He found it satisfactory, and said so, and his father stepped to the table and took up the pen. It might have been better for me, possibly, if I had let him alone, but I didn’t. I said,

“Don’tⒶtextual note sign it. Let ColonelⒶtextual note Fred read it to me first.”Ⓐtextual note

ColonelⒶtextual note Fred read it, and I said I was glad I had come in time to interfere. The Century Company was the party of the second part. It proposed to pay the General 10 per centⒶtextual note royaltyⒶtextual note. Of course this was nonsense—but the proposal had its source in ignorance, not dishonesty. The great Century Company knew all about magazine publishing; noⒶtextual note one could teach them anything about that industry; butⒶtextual note, at that time, they had had no experience of subscription publishing, and they probably had nothing in their minds except trade-publishingⒶtextual note. They could not even have had any valuable experience in trade-publishingⒶtextual note, or they would not have asked General Grant to furnish a book on the royalty commonly granted to authors of no name or repute.

I explained that these terms would never do; that they were all wrong, unfair, unjust. I said,

“StrikeⒶtextual note out the 10 per centⒶtextual note and put 20 per centⒶtextual note in its place. Better still, put 75 per centⒶtextual note of the netⒶtextual note returns in its place.”

The General demurred, and quite decidedly. He said they would never pay those terms.

I said that that was a matter of no consequence, since there was not a reputable publisher in America who would not be very glad to pay them.

The General still shook his head. He was still desirous of signing the contract as it stood.

I pointed out that the contract as it stood had an offensive detail in it which I had never heard of in the 10 per centⒶtextual note contract of even the most obscure author—that this contract not only proposed a 10 per centⒶtextual note royalty for such a colossus as General Grant, but it also had in it a requirement that out of that 10 per centⒶtextual note must come some trivial tax for the book’s shareⒶtextual note of clerk hire, house rent, sweeping out the offices, or some such nonsense as that. I said he ought to have three-fourths of the profits and let the publisher pay running expenses out of his remaining fourth.

The idea distressed General Grant. He thought it placed him in the attitude of a robber—robber of a publisher. I said that if he regarded that as a crime it was because his education had been neglected.Ⓐtextual note I said it was not a crime, and was always rewarded in heavenⒶtextual note with two halos. Would be, if it ever happened.

The General was immovable, and challenged me to name the publisher that would be willing to have this noble deed perpetrated upon him. I named theⒶtextual note American Publishing Company of Hartford. He asked if I could prove my position. I said I could furnish the proof, by telegraph, in six hours—three hours for my dispatchⒶtextual note to go to Hartford, three hours for Bliss’s jubilant acceptance to return by the same electric gravel-trainⒶtextual note—that if he needed this answer quicker I would walk up to Hartford and fetch it.

The General still stood out. But Fred Grant was beginning to be persuaded. He proposed that the Century contract be laid on the table for twenty-four hours, and that meantime the situation be examined and discussed. He said that this thing was not a matter of sentiment; it was a matter of pure business, and should be examined from that point of view alone. His remark about sentiment had a bearing. The reason was this. The broking firm of Grant and Ward—consisting of General Grant, Mr. Ward (called for a time the “LittleⒶtextual note Napoleon of Finance”Ⓐtextual note) and Ward’s confederate,Ⓐtextual note Fish—had swindled General Grant out of every penny he had in the world. And at a time when he did not know where to turn for bread, Roswell Smith, head of the Century Company, offered him five hundred dollars per article for four magazine articles about certain great battles of the Civil WarⒶtextual note. The offer came to the despairing old hero like the fabled straw to the drowning man. He accepted it with gratitude, and wrote the articles and delivered them. They were easily worth ten thousand dollars apiece, but he didn’t know it. Five hundred dollars apiece seemed to him fabulous pay for a trifle of pleasant and unlaborious scribbling.

He was now most lothⒶtextual note to desert these benefactors of his. To his military mind and [begin page 62] training it seemed disloyalty. If I remember rightly his first article lifted the Century’s subscription list from aⒶtextual note hundred thousand copies to two hundred and twenty thousand. This made the Century’s advertisement pages, for that month, worth more than double the money they had ever commandedⒶtextual note in any previous month. At a guess, I should say that this increase of patronage was worth, that month, eight thousand dollars. This is a safe estimate, a conservative estimate.

The doubled subscription list established in that month was Ⓐtextual notedestined to continue for years. It was destinedⒶtextual note to increase the magazine’s advertisement income about eight or ten thousand dollars a month during six years. I have said that each of General Grant’s articles was worth ten thousand dollars instead of five hundred. I could say that each of the four articles was worth twenty-five thousand dollars and still be within bounds.

I began to tout for the American Publishing Company. I argued that that Company had been first in the field as applicants for a volume of GrantⒶtextual note MemoirsⒶtextual note, and that perhaps they ought to have a chance at a bid before the Century Company.Ⓐtextual note This seemed to be news to General Grant. But I reminded him that once during the apparently wonderfully prosperous days of the firm of Grant and Ward I called upon himⒶtextual note in his private office one day, helped him to consume his luncheon, and begged him to write his MemoirsⒶtextual note and give them to the American Publishing Company. He had declined at the time, and most decidedly, saying he was not in need of money, and that he was not a literary person and could not write the MemoirsⒶtextual note.

I think we left the contract matter to stew for that time, and took it up again the next morning. I did a good deal of thinking during the interval. I knew quite well that the American Publishing Company would be glad to get General Grant’s Memoirs on a basis of three-quarters profit for him, to one-quarter for themselves. Indeed I knew quite well that there was not a publisher in the country—I mean a publisher experienced in the subscription publishing business—who would not be glad to get the book on those terms. I was fully expecting to presently hand that book to Frank Bliss and the American Publishing Company and enrich that den of reptiles—but the sober second thought came then. I reflected that that Company had been robbing me for years and building theological factories out of the proceeds, and that now was my chance to feed fat the ancient grudge I bore themⒺexplanatory note.

At the second conference with the General and Fred,Ⓐtextual note the General exhibited some of the modesty which was so large a feature of his nature. General Sherman had published his Memoirs in two large volumes, with ScribnersⒶtextual note, and that publication had been a notable event. General Grant said:Ⓐtextual note

“Sherman told me that his profits on that book were twenty-five thousand dollars. Do you believe I could get as much out of my book?”

I said I not only believed but I knew that he would achieve a vastly greater profit than that—that Sherman’s book was published in the trade;Ⓐtextual note that it was a suitable book for subscription distribution, and oughtⒶtextual note to have been published in that wayⒺexplanatory note;Ⓐtextual note that not many books wereⒶtextual note suitable to that method of publishing, but that the Memoirs of such illustrious persons as Sherman and Grant were peculiarly adapted to that method;Ⓐtextual note that [begin page 63] a book which containedⒶtextual note the right material for that method would harvest from eight to ten times as much profit by subscription as it could be made to produce by trade sale.

The General had his doubts that he could gather twenty-five thousand dollars’Ⓐtextual note profit from his Memoirs. I inquired why. He said he had already applied the test,Ⓐtextual note and had secured the evidence and the verdict. I wondered where he could have gotten such evidence and such a verdict, and he explained. He said he had offered to sell his Memoirs out and out to Roswell Smith for twenty-five thousand dollars,Ⓐtextual note and that the proposition had so frightened Smith that he hardly had breath enough left in his clothes to decline with.

Then I had an idea. It suddenly occurred to me that I was a publisher myself. I had not thought of it before. I said,

“SellⒶtextual note me the Memoirs, General. I am a publisher. I will pay double price. I have a check-book in my pocket; take my check for fifty thousand dollars now,Ⓐtextual note and let’s draw the contract.”

General Grant was as prompt in declining this as Roswell Smith had been in declining the other offer. He said he wouldn’t hear of such a thing. He said we were friends, and if I should fail to get the money back out of his book— He stopped there, and said there was no occasion to go into particulars, he simply would not consent to help a friend run any such risk.

Then I said,

“GiveⒶtextual note me the book on the terms which I have already suggested that you make with the Century people—20 per centⒶtextual note royalty, or, in lieu of that, 75 per centⒶtextual note of the profits on the publication to go to you, I to pay all running expenses such as salaries, etc., out of my fourth.”

He laughed at that, and asked me what my profit out of that remnant would be.

I said,Ⓐtextual note aⒶtextual note hundred thousand dollars in six months.

He was dealing with a literary person. He was aware, by authority of all the traditions, that literary persons are flighty, romantic, unpractical, and, in business matters, do not know enough to come in when it rains, or at any other time. He did not say that he attached no value to these flights of my imagination, for he was too kindly to say hurtful things, but he might better have said it, because he looked it with ten-fold emphasis,Ⓐtextual note and the look covered the whole ground. To make conversation, I suppose, he asked me what I based this dream upon—if it had a basis.

IⒶtextual note said,

“IⒶtextual note base it upon the difference between your literary commercial value and mine. My first two books sold aⒶtextual note hundred and fifty thousand copies each—three dollars and a halfⒶtextual note per volume in cloth, costlier volumes at a higher price according to binding—average price of the hundred and fifty thousand, four dollars apiece. I know that your commercial value is easily four times as great as mine; therefore I know it to be a perfectly safe guess that your book will sell six hundred thousand single volumes,Ⓐtextual note and that the clear profit to you will be half a million dollars,Ⓐtextual note and the clear profit to me aⒶtextual note hundred thousand.”Ⓐtextual note

We had a long discussion over the matter. Finally General Grant telegraphed for his particular friend, George W. Childs of the Philadelphia Ledger, Ⓐtextual note to come up to New [begin page 64] York and furnish an opinion. Childs came. I convinced him that Webster’s publishing machinery was ample and in good order. Then Childs delivered the verdict,Ⓐtextual note “Give the book to Clemens.” ColonelⒶtextual note Fred Grant endorsed and repeated the verdict,Ⓐtextual note “Give the book to Clemens.” So the contract was drawn and signed, and Webster took hold of his new job at once.

By my existing contract with Webster he merely had a salary of twenty-five hundred dollars a year. He had declined to accept, gratis, of an interest in the business, for he was a cautious person and averse fromⒶtextual note running risks. I now offered him, gratis, a tenth share in the business—the contract as to other details to remain as before. Then,Ⓐtextual note as a counter proposition,Ⓐtextual note he modestly offered this: that his salary be increased to thirty-five hundred dollars a year; that he have 10 per centⒶtextual note of the profits accruing from the Grant book, and that I furnish all the capital required at 7Ⓐtextual note per centⒺexplanatory note.

I said I should be satisfied with this arrangement.

Then he called in his pal, Whitford, who drew the contract. I couldn’t understand the contract—I never could understand any contract—and I asked my brother-in-law, General LangdonⒺexplanatory note, a trained business man, to understand it for me. He read it and said it was all right. So we signed it and sealed it. I was to find out later that the contract gave Webster 10 per centⒶtextual note of the profits on the Grant book and Ⓐtextual note 10 per centⒶtextual note interest in the profits of the whole business—but not any interest in such losses as might occur.

The news went forth that General Grant was going to write his Memoirs,Ⓐtextual note and that the firm of Charles L. Webster and CompanyⒶtextual note would publish them. The announcement produced a vast sensation throughout the country. The nation was glad, and this feeling poured itself heartily out in all the newspapers. On the one day,Ⓐtextual note young Webster was as unknown as the unborn babe. The next day he was a notoriety. His name was in every paper in the United States. He was young, he was human, heⒶtextual note naturally mistook this transient notoriety for fame; and by consequence he had to get his hat enlarged. His juvenile joy in his new grandeur was a pretty and pleasant spectacle to see. The first thing he did was to move out of his modest quarters and secure quarters better suited to his new importanceⒺexplanatory note as the most distinguished publisher in the country.