So I was deeply moved by the prospect of seeing him.
I could not remember that I had ever been "introduced" to anybody.

I knew that people put their wits on exhibition and often flung down a "snag" by way of demonstrating their fitness for the honor, when they were introduced in books.

I remember asking rather timidly: "What shall I say when--when you--introduce me ?" "Oh, say anything that you want to say," he answered with a look of amusement.
"I'm kind o' scared," I said.
"You needn't be--he was once a poor boy just like you." "Just like _me_!" I repeated, thoughtfully, for while I had heard a good deal of that kind of thing in our home, it had not, somehow, got under my jacket, as they used to say.
"Just like _you_--cowhide and all--the son of a small freeholder in Kinderhook on the Hudson," he went on.

"But he was well fed in brain and body and kept his heart clean.

So, of course, he grew and is still growing.