Bennett was too fickle and whimsical an employer to suit me, and I had no disposition to expose myself to his whims.  With Young I was always on the best terms, and he was disposed to employ me when a momentary service was required, but I had had one experience with his chief, which was sufficient.  He had offered me the London agency of the “Herald” at a time when any constant occupation would have been acceptable, and we had come to terms, when suddenly he was taken with the notion that Edmund Yates, in addition to the service to the paper, would be of use to him in social ways, and he dropped me and appointed Yates, to drop him a little later, paying him a year’s salary to break the contract.

One bit of work I did for the “Herald” which I remember with much pleasure.  It was the reporting of Beaconsfield’s Aylesbury speech, not a stenographic report, for that they had from the English press, but a letter on the occasion as a demonstration.  I went to Aylesbury, and, as Beaconsfield was to speak twice,—­once at the farmers’ ordinary and then at the assembly rooms,—­I dined at the ordinary; and as all the places in the assembly rooms had been taken before the dinner was over, I had to employ some assurance to hear the principal speech.  As soon as the company rose from the table, I pushed through to where Beaconsfield was standing, and, presenting my card as correspondent of the New York “Herald,” asked him to be kind enough to put me in the way of hearing him, explaining why I had lost my chance through remaining to hear him at the dinner.  He turned to one of the young men who were with him, remarking that my card would take me anywhere, and said, “See that Mr. Stillman has a place near me,” and to me, “Keep close to me,” which I did, and took a seat on the edge of the platform, at his feet; and I certainly never heard a more effective speech.  The lordly, triumphant manner with which he bantered Gladstone for his dealings in the Straits of Malacca, the demonstrative confidence with which he took victory for granted, and the magnetism of his personal bearing, made an impression on me quite unique in my experience of men.  Gracious is the only word which I can apply to his manner to those around him, and it had a fascination over them which I could perfectly understand, and I could easily comprehend that he should have a surrounding of devotees.  The serene, absolute self-confidence he evidently felt was of a nature to inspire a corresponding confidence in his followers.  It was an interesting display of the power of a magnetic nature, and gave me a higher idea of the man than all his writings had given or could give.  For his intellectual powers and their printed results I never had a high opinion, but his was one of the most interesting and remarkable personalities I ever encountered.