General Grant, however, was still somewhat uneasy as to the terms.  He thought he was taking an unfair advantage in receiving so large a proportion of the profits.  He wrote to Clemens, asking him which of his two propositions—­the twenty per cent. gross-royalty or the seventy per cent. of the net profit—­would be the best all around.  Clemens sent Webster to tell him that he believed the simplest, as well as the most profitable for the author, would be the twenty per cent. arrangement.  Whereupon Grant replied that he would take the alternative; as in that case, if the book were a failure, and there were no profits, Clemens would not be obliged to pay him anything.  He could not consent to the thought of receiving twenty per cent. on a book published at a loss.

Meantime, Grant had developed a serious illness.  The humiliation of his business failure had undermined his health.  The papers announced his malady as cancer of the tongue.  In a memorandum which Clemens made, February 26, 1885, he states that on the 21st he called at the Grant home, 3 East 66th Street, and was astonished to see how thin and weak the General looked.  He was astonished because the newspaper, in a second report, had said the threatening symptoms had disappeared, that the cancer alarm was a false one.

    I took for granted the report, and said I had been glad to see that
    news.  He smiled and said, “Yes—­if it had only been true.”

    One of the physicians was present, and he startled me by saying the
    General’s condition was the opposite of encouraging.

Then the talk drifted to business, and the General presently said:  “I mean you shall have the book—­I have about made up my mind to that—­but I wish to write to Mr. Roswell Smith first, and tell him I have so decided.  I think this is due him.”

From the beginning the General has shown a fine delicacy toward those people—­a delicacy which was native to the character of the man who put into the Appomattox terms of surrender the words, “Officers may retain their side-arms,” to save General Lee the humiliation of giving up his sword. [Note-book.]

The physician present was Dr. Douglas, and upon Clemens assuming that the General’s trouble was probably due to smoking, also that it was a warning to those who smoked to excess, himself included, Dr. Douglas said that General Grant’s affliction could not be attributed altogether to smoking, but far more to his distress of mind, his year-long depression of spirit, the grief of his financial disaster.  Dr. Douglas’s remark started General Grant upon the subject of his connection with Ward, which he discussed with great freedom and apparent relief of mind.  Never at any time did he betray any resentment toward Ward, but characterized him as one might an offending child.  He spoke as a man who has been deeply wronged and humiliated and betrayed, but without a venomous expression or one with revengeful nature.  Clemens confessed in his notes that all the time he himself was “inwardly boiling—­scalping Ward—­flaying him alive —­breaking him on the wheel—­pounding him to a jelly.”