SENSE OF LOCALITY
He had little order in the care of papers; his desk was for the most part in confusion. And yet he had a method of his own, with all the apparent disorder. When his desk reached the limit of congestion, letters and papers were carefully collected, classified and filed for him and the coast thus cleared. "I put that paper just where I wanted it, why did you remove it?" was his usual comment on this desk-clearing process. His sense of locality was so keen that many times I have seen him produce a needed document from a large bundle, or a letter from beneath a scattered pile, without a moments hesitation. He could have found that celebrated needle if he had had anything to do with putting it in the hay. His volume of Shakespeare usually served as a paper-weight on his office desk. It was always in sight and often taken up even in busy hours. He needed for it no index or concordance. Page, column and line were instantly turned to. He has said to me, "I know where to find that passage in Hamlet; it is on page 432, on the right hand side, left hand column, and at the bottom of the column."
Equally remarkable was his far-reaching accuracy of vision. His eagle eye could take in more at a single glance than most men's after close inspection. Very little going on around him escaped his notice. Once, in a trial out West, he was to open the case. Counsel for the other side sat to the front and left of him, several feet removed, going over his notes prior to oral presentation. The Colonel's quick eye caught the paper, and as he assured me, without intention or purpose -- before he could help it -- he had taken in several points of his adversary's argument. He was bothered, he said, in making his opening, by the necessity of avoiding the suspicion that he had in any way gained possession of his opponent's brief. He made no unfair use of the accident. In fact, he said, the knowledge hampered more than helped him. |
