Chapter XIII: Part 13

“That’s the case here with us,” the President said in conclusion. “We must let the other nations know that we propose to settle our family row in our own way, and ‘teach these brats their places’ (the seceding States) if we have to ‘lick the hide off’ of each and every one of them. And, like the old woman, we don’t want any ‘sneakin’ ‘round’ by other countries who would like to find out how we are to do it, either.

“Now, Seward, you write some diplomatic notes to that effect.”

And the Cabinet session closed.

DIDN’T EVEN NEED STILTS.

As the President considered it his duty to keep in touch with all the improvements in the armament of the vessels belonging to the United States Navy, he was necessarily interested in the various types of these floating fortresses. Not only was it required of the Navy Department to furnish seagoing warships, deep-draught vessels for the great rivers and the lakes, but this Department also found use for little gunboats which could creep along in the shallowest of water and attack the Confederates in by-places and swamps.

The consequence of the interest taken by Mr. Lincoln in the Navy was that he was besieged, day and night, by steamboat contractors, each one eager to sell his product to the Washington Government. All sorts of experiments were tried, some being dire failures, while others were more than fairly successful. More than once had these tiny war vessels proved themselves of great service, and the United States Government had a large number of them built.

There was one particular contractor who bothered the President more than all the others put together. He was constantly impressing upon Mr. Lincoln the great superiority of his boats, because they would run in such shallow water.

“Oh, yes,” replied the President, “I’ve no doubt they’ll run anywhere where the ground is a little moist!”

“HOW DO YOU GET OUT OF THIS PLACE?”

“It seems to me,” remarked the President one day while reading, over some of the appealing telegrams sent to the War Department by General McClellan, “that McClellan has been wandering around and has sort of got lost. He’s been hollering for help ever since he went South--wants somebody to come to his deliverance and get him out of the place he’s got into.

“He reminds me of the story of a man out in Illinois who, in company with a number of friends, visited the State penitentiary. They wandered all through the institution and saw everything, but just about the time to depart this particular man became separated from his friends and couldn’t find his way out.

“He roamed up and down one corridor after another, becoming more desperate all the time, when, at last, he came across a convict who was looking out from between the bars of his cell-door. Here was salvation at last. Hurrying up to the prisoner he hastily asked,

“‘Say! How do you get out of this place?”

“TAD” INTRODUCES “OUR FRIENDS.”

President Lincoln often avoided interviews with delegations representing various States, especially when he knew the objects of their errands, and was aware he could not grant their requests. This was the case with several commissioners from Kentucky, who were put off from day to day.

They were about to give up in despair, and were leaving the White House lobby, their speech being interspersed with vehement and uncomplimentary terms concerning “Old Abe,” when “Tad” happened along. He caught at these words, and asked one of them if they wanted to see “Old Abe,” laughing at the same time.

“Yes,” he replied.

“Wait a minute,” said “Tad,” and rushed into his father’s office. Said he, “Papa, may I introduce some friends to you?”

His father, always indulgent and ready to make him happy, kindly said, “Yes, my son, I will see your friends.”

“Tad” went to the Kentuckians again, and asked a very dignified looking gentleman of the party his name. He was told his name. He then said, “Come, gentlemen,” and they followed him.

Leading them up to the President, “Tad,” with much dignity, said, “Papa, let me introduce to you Judge ----, of Kentucky;” and quickly added, “Now Judge, you introduce the other gentlemen.”

The introductions were gone through with, and they turned out to be the gentlemen Mr. Lincoln had been avoiding for a week. Mr. Lincoln reached for the boy, took him in his lap, kissed him, and told him it was all right, and that he had introduced his friend like a little gentleman as he was. Tad was eleven years old at this time.

The President was pleased with Tad’s diplomacy, and often laughed at the incident as he told others of it. One day while caressing the boy, he asked him why he called those gentlemen “his friends.” “Well,” said Tad, “I had seen them so often, and they looked so good and sorry, and said they were from Kentucky, that I thought they must be our friends.” “That is right, my son,” said Mr. Lincoln; “I would have the whole human race your friends and mine, if it were possible.”

MIXED UP WORSE THAN BEFORE.

The President told a story which most beautifully illustrated the muddled situation of affairs at the time McClellan’s fate was hanging in the balance. McClellan’s work was not satisfactory, but the President hesitated to remove him; the general was so slow that the Confederates marched all around him; and, to add to the dilemma, the President could not find a suitable man to take McClellan’s place.

The latter was a political, as well as a military, factor; his friends threatened that, if he was removed, many war Democrats would cast their influence with the South, etc. It was, altogether, a sad mix-up, and the President, for a time, was at his wits’ end. He was assailed on all sides with advice, but none of it was worth acting upon.

“This situation reminds me,” said the President at a Cabinet meeting one day not long before the appointment of General Halleck as McClellan’s successor in command of the Union forces, “of a Union man in Kentucky whose two sons enlisted in the Federal Army. His wife was of Confederate sympathies. His nearest neighbor was a Confederate in feeling, and his two sons were fighting under Lee. This neighbor’s wife was a Union woman and it nearly broke her heart to know that her sons were arrayed against the Union.

“Finally, the two men, after each had talked the matter over with his wife, agreed to obtain divorces; this they, did, and the Union man and Union woman were wedded, as were the Confederate man and the Confederate woman--the men swapped wives, in short. But this didn’t seem to help matters any, for the sons of the Union woman were still fighting for the South, and the sons of the Confederate woman continued in the Federal Army; the Union husband couldn’t get along with his Union wife, and the Confederate husband and his Confederate wife couldn’t agree upon anything, being forever fussing and quarreling.

“It’s the same thing with the Army. It doesn’t seem worth while to secure divorces and then marry the Army and McClellan to others, for they won’t get along any better than they do now, and there’ll only be a new set of heartaches started. I think we’d better wait; perhaps a real fighting general will come along some of these days, and then we’ll all be happy. If you go to mixing in a mix-up, you only make the muddle worse.”

“LONG ABE’S” FEET “PROTRUDED OVER.”

George M. Pullman, the great sleeping-car builder, once told a joke in which Lincoln was the prominent figure. In fact, there wouldn’t have been any joke had it not been for “Long Abe.” At the time of the occurrence, which was the foundation for the joke--and Pullman admitted that the latter was on him--Pullman was the conductor of his only sleeping-car. The latter was an experiment, and Pullman was doing everything possible to get the railroads to take hold of it.

“One night,” said Pullman in telling the story, “as we were about going out of Chicago--this was long before Lincoln was what you might call a renowned man--a long, lean, ugly man, with a wart on his cheek, came into the depot. He paid me fifty cents, and half a berth was assigned him. Then he took off his coat and vest and hung them up, and they fitted the peg about as well as they fitted him. Then he kicked off his boots, which were of surprising length, turned into the berth, and, undoubtedly having an easy conscience, was sleeping like a healthy baby before the car left the depot.

“Pretty soon along came another passenger and paid his fifty cents. In two minutes he was back at me, angry as a wet hen.

“‘There’s a man in that berth of mine,’ said he, hotly, ‘and he’s about ten feet high. How am I going to sleep there, I’d like to know? Go and look at him.’

“In I went--mad, too. The tall, lank man’s knees were under his chin, his arms were stretched across the bed and his feet were stored comfortably--for him. I shook him until he awoke, and then told him if he wanted the whole berth he would have to pay $1.

“‘My dear sir,’ said the tall man, ‘a contract is a contract. I have paid you fifty cents for half this berth, and, as you see, I’m occupying it. There’s the other half,’ pointing to a strip about six inches wide. ‘Sell that and don’t disturb me again.’

“And so saying, the man with a wart on his face went to sleep again. He was Abraham Lincoln, and he never grew any shorter afterward. We became great friends, and often laughed over the incident.”

COULD LICK ANY MAN IN THE CROWD.

When the enemies of General Grant were bothering the President with emphatic and repeated demands that the “Silent Man” be removed from command, Mr. Lincoln remained firm. He would not consent to lose the services of so valuable a soldier. “Grant fights,” said he in response to the charges made that Grant was a butcher, a drunkard, an incompetent and a general who did not know his business.

“That reminds me of a story,” President Lincoln said one day to a delegation of the “Grant-is-no-good” style.

“Out in my State of Illinois there was a man nominated for sheriff of the county. He was a good man for the office, brave, determined and honest, but not much of an orator. In fact, he couldn’t talk at all; he couldn’t make a speech to save his life.

“His friends knew he was a man who would preserve the peace of the county and perform the duties devolving upon him all right, but the people of the county didn’t know it. They wanted him to come out boldly on the platform at political meetings and state his convictions and principles; they had been used to speeches from candidates, and were somewhat suspicious of a man who was afraid to open his mouth.

“At last the candidate consented to make a speech, and his friends were delighted. The candidate was on hand, and, when he was called upon, advanced to the front and faced the crowd. There was a glitter in his eye that wasn’t pleasing, and the way he walked out to the front of the stand showed that he knew just what he wanted to say.

“‘Feller Citizens,’ was his beginning, the words spoken quietly, ‘I’m not a speakin’ man; I ain’t no orator, an’ I never stood up before a lot of people in my life before; I’m not goin’ to make no speech, ‘xcept to say that I can lick any man in the crowd!’”

HIS WAY TO A CHILD’S HEART.

Charles E. Anthony’s one meeting with Mr. Lincoln presents an interesting contrast to those of the men who shared the emancipator’s interest in public affairs. It was in the latter part of the winter of 1861, a short time before Mr. Lincoln left for his inauguration at Washington. Judge Anthony went to the Sherman House, where the President-elect was stopping, and took with him his son, Charles, then but a little boy. Charles played about the room as a child will, looking at whatever interested him for the time, and when the interview with his father was over he was ready to go.

But Mr. Lincoln, ever interested in little children, called the lad to him and took him upon his great knee.

“My impression of him all the time I had been playing about the room,” said Mr. Anthony, “was that he was a terribly homely man. I was rather repelled. But no sooner did he speak to me than the expression of his face changed completely, or, rather, my view of it changed. It at once became kindly and attractive. He asked me some questions, seeming instantly to find in the turmoil of all the great questions that must have been heavy upon him, the very ones that would go to the thought of a child. I answered him without hesitation, and after a moment he patted my shoulder and said:

“‘Well, you’ll be a man before your mother yet,’ and put me down.

“I had never before heard the homely old expression, and it puzzled me for a time. After a moment I understood it, but he looked at me while I was puzzling over it, and seemed to be amused, as no doubt he was.”

The incident simply illustrates the ease and readiness with which Lincoln could turn from the mighty questions before the nation, give a moment’s interested attention to a child, and return at once to matters of state.

“LEFT IT THE WOMEN TO HOWL ABOUT ME.”

Donn Piatt, one of the brightest newspaper writers in the country, told a good story on the President in regard to the refusal of the latter to sanction the death penalty in cases of desertion from the Union Army.

“There was far more policy in this course,” said Piatt, “than kind feeling. To assert the contrary is to detract from Lincoln’s force of character, as well as intellect. Our War President was not lost in his high admiration of brigadiers and major-generals, and had a positive dislike for their methods and the despotism upon which an army is based. He knew that he was dependent upon volunteers for soldiers, and to force upon such men as those the stern discipline of the Regular Army was to render the service unpopular. And it pleased him to be the source of mercy, as well as the fountain of honor, in this direction.

“I was sitting with General Dan Tyler, of Connecticut, in the antechamber of the War Department, shortly after the adjournment of the Buell Court of Inquiry, of which we had been members, when President Lincoln came in from the room of Secretary Stanton. Seeing us, he said: ‘Well, gentlemen, have you any matter worth reporting?’

“‘I think so, Mr. President,’ replied General Tyler. ‘We had it proven that Bragg, with less than ten thousand men, drove your eighty-three thousand men under Buell back from before Chattanooga, down to the Ohio at Louisville, marched around us twice, then doubled us up at Perryville, and finally got out of the State of Kentucky with all his plunder.’

“‘Now, Tyler,’ returned the President, ‘what is the meaning of all this; what is the lesson? Don’t our men march as well, and fight as well, as these rebels? If not, there is a fault somewhere. We are all of the same family--same sort.’

“‘Yes, there is a lesson,’ replied General Tyler; ‘we are of the same sort, but subject to different handling. Bragg’s little force was superior to our larger number because he had it under control. If a man left his ranks, he was punished; if he deserted, he was shot. We had nothing of that sort. If we attempt to shoot a deserter you pardon him, and our army is without discipline.’

“The President looked perplexed. ‘Why do you interfere?’ continued General Tyler. ‘Congress has taken from you all responsibility.’

“‘Yes,’ answered the President impatiently, ‘Congress has taken the responsibility and left the women to howl all about me,’ and so he strode away.”

HE’D RUIN ALL THE OTHER CONVICTS.

One of the droll stories brought into play by the President as an ally in support of his contention, proved most effective. Politics was rife among the generals of the Union Army, and there was more “wire-pulling” to prevent the advancement of fellow commanders than the laying of plans to defeat the Confederates in battle.

However, when it so happened that the name of a particularly unpopular general was sent to the Senate for confirmation, the protest against his promotion was almost unanimous. The nomination didn’t seem to please anyone. Generals who were enemies before conferred together for the purpose of bringing every possible influence to bear upon the Senate and securing the rejection of the hated leader’s name. The President was surprised. He had never known such unanimity before.

“You remind me,” said the President to a delegation of officers which called upon him one day to present a fresh protest to him regarding the nomination, “of a visit a certain Governor paid to the Penitentiary of his State. It had been announced that the Governor would hear the story of every inmate of the institution, and was prepared to rectify, either by commutation or pardon, any wrongs that had been done to any prisoner.

“One by one the convicts appeared before His Excellency, and each one maintained that he was an innocent man, who had been sent to prison because the police didn’t like him, or his friends and relatives wanted his property, or he was too popular, etc., etc. The last prisoner to appear was an individual who was not all prepossessing. His face was against him; his eyes were shifty; he didn’t have the appearance of an honest man, and he didn’t act like one.

“‘Well,’ asked the Governor, impatiently, ‘I suppose you’re innocent like the rest of these fellows?’

“‘No, Governor,’ was the unexpected answer; ‘I was guilty of the crime they charged against me, and I got just what I deserved.’

“When he had recovered from his astonishment, the Governor, looking the fellow squarely in the face, remarked with emphasis: ‘I’ll have to pardon you, because I don’t want to leave so bad a man as you are in the company of such innocent sufferers as I have discovered your fellow-convicts to be. You might corrupt them and teach them wicked tricks. As soon as I get back to the capital, I’ll have the papers made out.’

“You gentlemen,” continued the President, “ought to be glad that so bad a man, as you represent this officer to be, is to get his promotion, for then you won’t be forced to associate with him and suffer the contamination of his presence and influence. I will do all I can to have the Senate confirm him.”

And he was confirmed.

IN A HOPELESS MINORITY.

The President was often in opposition to the general public sentiment of the North upon certain questions of policy, but he bided his time, and things usually came out as he wanted them. It was Lincoln’s opinion, from the first, that apology and reparation to England must be made by the United States because of the arrest, upon the high seas, of the Confederate Commissioners, Mason and Slidell. The country, however (the Northern States), was wild for a conflict with England.

“One war at a time,” quietly remarked the President at a Cabinet meeting, where he found the majority of his advisers unfavorably disposed to “backing down.” But one member of the Cabinet was a really strong supporter of the President in his attitude.

“I am reminded,” the President said after the various arguments had been put forward by the members of the Cabinet, “of a fellow out in my State of Illinois who happened to stray into a church while a revival meeting was in progress. To be truthful, this individual was not entirely sober, and with that instinct which seems to impel all men in his condition to assume a prominent part in proceedings, he walked up the aisle to the very front pew.

“All noticed him, but he did not care; for awhile he joined audibly in the singing, said ‘Amen’ at the close of the prayers, but, drowsiness overcoming him, he went to sleep. Before the meeting closed, the pastor asked the usual question--‘Who are on the Lord’s side?’--and the congregation arose en masse. When he asked, ‘Who are on the side of the Devil?’ the sleeper was about waking up. He heard a portion of the interrogatory, and, seeing the minister on his feet, arose.

“‘I don’t exactly understand the question,’ he said, ‘but I’ll stand by you, parson, to the last. But it seems to me,’ he added, ‘that we’re in a hopeless minority.’

“I’m in a hopeless minority now,” said the President, “and I’ll have to admit it.”

“DID YE ASK MORRISSEY YET?”

John Morrissey, the noted prize fighter, was the “Boss” of Tammany Hall during the Civil War period. It pleased his fancy to go to Congress, and his obedient constituents sent him there. Morrissey was such an absolute despot that the New York City democracy could not make a move without his consent, and many of the Tammanyites were so afraid of him that they would not even enter into business ventures without consulting the autocrat.

President Lincoln had been seriously annoyed by some of his generals, who were afraid to make the slightest move before asking advice from Washington. One commander, in particular, was so cautious that he telegraphed the War Department upon the slightest pretext, the result being that his troops were lying in camp doing nothing, when they should have been in the field.

“This general reminds me,” the President said one day while talking to Secretary Stanton, at the War Department, “of a story I once heard about a Tammany man. He happened to meet a friend, also a member of Tammany, on the street, and in the course of the talk the friend, who was beaming with smiles and good nature, told the other Tammanyite that he was going to be married.

“This first Tammany man looked more serious than men usually do upon hearing of the impending happiness of a friend. In fact, his face seemed to take on a look of anxiety and worry.

“‘Ain’t you glad to know that I’m to get married?’ demanded the second Tammanyite, somewhat in a huff.

“‘Of course I am,’ was the reply; ‘but,’ putting his mouth close to the ear of the other, ‘have ye asked Morrissey yet?’

“Now, this general of whom we are speaking, wouldn’t dare order out the guard without asking Morrissey,” concluded the President.

GOT THE LAUGH ON DOUGLAS.

At one time, when Lincoln and Douglas were “stumping” Illinois, they met at a certain town, and it was agreed that they would have a joint debate. Douglas was the first speaker, and in the course of his talk remarked that in early life, his father, who, he said, was an excellent cooper by trade, apprenticed him out to learn the cabinet business.

This was too good for Lincoln to let pass, so when his turn came to reply, he said:

“I had understood before that Mr. Douglas had been bound out to learn the cabinet-making business, which is all well enough, but I was not aware until now that his father was a cooper. I have no doubt, however, that he was one, and I am certain, also, that he was a very good one, for (here Lincoln gently bowed toward Douglas) he has made one of the best whiskey casks I have ever seen.”

As Douglas was a short heavy-set man, and occasionally imbibed, the pith of the joke was at once apparent, and most heartily enjoyed by all.

On another occasion, Douglas made a point against Lincoln by telling the crowd that when he first knew Lincoln he was a “grocery-keeper,” and sold whiskey, cigars, etc.

“Mr. L.,” he said, “was a very good bar-tender!” This brought the laugh on Lincoln, whose reply, however, soon came, and then the laugh was on the other side.

“What Mr. Douglas has said, gentlemen,” replied Lincoln, “is true enough; I did keep a grocery and I did sell cotton, candles and cigars, and sometimes whiskey; but I remember in those days that Mr. Douglas was one of my best customers.”

“I can also say this; that I have since left my side of the counter, while Mr. Douglas still sticks to his!”

This brought such a storm of cheers and laughter that Douglas was unable to reply.

“FIXED UP” A BIT FOR THE “CITY FOLKS.”

Mrs. Lincoln knew her husband was not “pretty,” but she liked to have him presentable when he appeared before the public. Stephen Fiske, in “When Lincoln Was First Inaugurated,” tells of Mrs. Lincoln’s anxiety to have the President-elect “smoothed down” a little when receiving a delegation that was to greet them upon reaching New York City.

“The train stopped,” writes Mr. Fiske, “and through the windows immense crowds could be seen; the cheering drowning the blowing off of steam of the locomotive. Then Mrs. Lincoln opened her handbag and said:

“‘Abraham, I must fix you up a bit for these city folks.’

“Mr. Lincoln gently lifted her upon the seat before him; she parted, combed and brushed his hair and arranged his black necktie.

“‘Do I look nice now, mother?’ he affectionately asked.

“‘Well, you’ll do, Abraham,’ replied Mrs. Lincoln critically. So he kissed her and lifted her down from the seat, and turned to meet Mayor Wood, courtly and suave, and to have his hand shaken by the other New York officials.”

EVEN REBELS OUGHT TO BE SAVED.

The Rev. Mr. Shrigley, of Philadelphia, a Universalist, had been nominated for hospital chaplain, and a protesting delegation went to Washington to see President Lincoln on the subject.

“We have called, Mr. President, to confer with you in regard to the appointment of Mr. Shrigley, of Philadelphia, as hospital chaplain.”

The President responded: “Oh, yes, gentlemen. I have sent his name to the Senate, and he will no doubt be confirmed at an early date.” One of the young men replied: “We have not come to ask for the appointment, but to solicit you to withdraw the nomination.”

“Ah!” said Lincoln, “that alters the case; but on what grounds do you wish the nomination withdrawn?”

The answer was: “Mr. Shrigley is not sound in his theological opinions.”

The President inquired: “On what question is the gentleman unsound?”

Response: “He does not believe in endless punishment; not only so, sir, but he believes that even the rebels themselves will be finally saved.”

“Is that so?” inquired the President.

The members of the committee responded, “Yes, yes.’

“Well, gentlemen, if that be so, and there is any way under Heaven whereby the rebels can be saved, then, for God’s sake and their sakes, let the man be appointed.”

The Rev. Mr. Shrigley was appointed, and served until the close of the war.

TRIED TO DO WHAT SEEMED BEST.

John M. Palmer, Major-General in the Volunteer Army, Governor of the State of Illinois, and United States Senator from the Sucker State, became acquainted with Lincoln in 1839, and the last time he saw the President was at the White House in February, 1865. Senator Palmer told the story of his interview as follows:

“I had come to Washington at the request of the Governor, to complain that Illinois had been credited with 18,000 too few troops. I saw Mr. Lincoln one afternoon, and he asked me to come again in the morning.

“Next morning I sat in the ante-room while several officers were relieved. At length I was told to enter the President’s room. Mr. Lincoln was in the hands of the barber.

“‘Come in, Palmer,’ he called out, ‘come in. You’re home folks. I can shave before you. I couldn’t before those others, and I have to do it some time.’

“We chatted about various matters, and at length I said:

“‘Well, Mr. Lincoln, if anybody had told me that in a great crisis like this the people were going out to a little one-horse town and pick out a one-horse lawyer for President I wouldn’t have believed it.’

“Mr. Lincoln whirled about in his chair, his face white with lather, a towel under his chin. At first I thought he was angry. Sweeping the barber away he leaned forward, and, placing one hand on my knee, said:

“‘Neither would I. But it was time when a man with a policy would have been fatal to the country. I have never had a policy. I have simply tried to do what seemed best each day, as each day came.’”

“HOLDING A CANDLE TO THE CZAR.”

England was anything but pleased when the Czar Alexander, of Russia, showed his friendship for the United States by sending a strong fleet to this country with the accompanying suggestion that Uncle Sam, through his representative, President Lincoln, could do whatever he saw fit with the ironclads and the munitions of war they had stowed away in their holds.

London “Punch,” on November 7th, 1863, printed the cartoon shown on this page, the text under the picture reading in this way: “Holding a candle to the * * * * *.” (Much the same thing.)

Of course, this was a covert sneer, intended to convey the impression that President Lincoln, in order to secure the support and friendship of the Emperor of Russia as long as the War of the Rebellion lasted, was willing to do all sorts of menial offices, even to the extent of holding the candle and lighting His Most Gracious Majesty, the White Czar, to his imperial bed-chamber.

It is a somewhat remarkable fact that the Emperor Alexander, who tendered inestimable aid to the President of the United States, was the Lincoln of Russia, having given freedom to millions of serfs in his empire; and, further than that, he was, like Lincoln, the victim of assassination. He was literally blown to pieces by a bomb thrown under his carriage while riding through the streets near the Winter Palace at St. Petersburg.

NASHVILLE WAS NOT SURRENDERED.

“I was told a mighty good story,” said the President one day at a Cabinet meeting, “by Colonel Granville Moody, ‘the fighting Methodist parson,’ as they used to call him in Tennessee. I happened to meet Moody in Philadelphia, where he was attending a conference.

“The story was about ‘Andy’ Johnson and General Buell. Colonel Moody happened to be in Nashville the day it was reported that Buell had decided to evacuate the city. The rebels, strongly re-inforced, were said to be within two days’ march of the capital. Of course, the city was greatly excited. Moody said he went in search of Johnson at the edge of the evening and found him at his office closeted with two gentlemen, who were walking the floor with him, one on each side. As he entered they retired, leaving him alone with Johnson, who came up to him, manifesting intense feeling, and said:

“‘Moody, we are sold out. Buell is a traitor. He is going to evacuate the city, and in forty-eight hours we will all be in the hands of the rebels!’

“Then he commenced pacing the floor again, twisting his hands and chafing like a caged tiger, utterly insensible to his friend’s entreaties to become calm. Suddenly he turned and said:

“‘Moody, can you pray?’

“‘That is my business, sir, as a minister of the gospel,’ returned the colonel.

“‘Well, Moody, I wish you would pray,’ said Johnson, and instantly both went down upon their knees at opposite sides of the room.

“As the prayer waxed fervent, Johnson began to respond in true Methodist style. Presently he crawled over on his hands and knees to Moody’s side and put his arms over him, manifesting the deepest emotion.

“Closing the prayer with a hearty ‘amen’ from each, they arose.

“Johnson took a long breath, and said, with emphasis:

“‘Moody, I feel better.’

“Shortly afterward he asked:

“‘Will you stand by me?’

“‘Certainly I will,’ was the answer.

“‘Well, Moody, I can depend upon you; you are one in a hundred thousand.’

“He then commenced pacing the floor again. Suddenly he wheeled, the current of his thought having changed, and said:

“‘Oh, Moody, I don’t want you to think I have become a religious man because I asked you to pray. I am sorry to say it, I am not, and never pretended to be religious. No one knows this better than you, but, Moody, there is one thing about it, I do believe in Almighty God, and I believe also in the Bible, and I say, d--n me if Nashville shall be surrendered!’

“And Nashville was not surrendered!”

HE COULDN’T WAIT FOR THE COLONEL.

General Fisk, attending a reception at the White House, saw waiting in the ante-room a poor old man from Tennessee, and learned that he had been waiting three or four days to get an audience, on which probably depended the life of his son, under sentence of death for some military offense.

General Fisk wrote his case in outline on a card and sent it in, with a special request that the President would see the man. In a moment the order came; and past impatient senators, governors and generals, the old man went.

He showed his papers to Mr. Lincoln, who said he would look into the case and give him the result next day.

The old man, in an agony of apprehension, looked up into the President’s sympathetic face and actually cried out:

“To-morrow may be too late! My son is under sentence of death! It ought to be decided now!”

His streaming tears told how much he was moved.

“Come,” said Mr. Lincoln, “wait a bit and I’ll tell you a story;” and then he told the old man General Fisk’s story about the swearing driver, as follows:

“The general had begun his military life as a colonel, and when he raised his regiment in Missouri he proposed to his men that he should do all the swearing of the regiment. They assented; and for months no instance was known of the violation of the promise.

“The colonel had a teamster named John Todd, who, as roads were not always the best, had some difficulty in commanding his temper and his tongue.

“John happened to be driving a mule team through a series of mudholes a little worse than usual, when, unable to restrain himself any longer, he burst forth into a volley of energetic oaths.

“The colonel took notice of the offense and brought John to account.

“‘John,’ said he, ‘didn’t you promise to let me do all the swearing of the regiment?’

“‘Yes, I did, colonel,’ he replied, ‘but the fact was, the swearing had to be done then or not at all, and you weren’t there to do it.’”

As he told the story the old man forgot his boy, and both the President and his listener had a hearty laugh together at its conclusion.

Then he wrote a few words which the old man read, and in which he found new occasion for tears; but the tears were tears of joy, for the words saved the life of his son.

LINCOLN PRONOUNCED THIS STORY FUNNY.

The President was heard to declare one day that the story given below was one of the funniest he ever heard.

One of General Fremont’s batteries of eight Parrott guns, supported by a squadron of horse commanded by Major Richards, was in sharp conflict with a battery of the enemy near at hand. Shells and shot were flying thick and fast, when the commander of the battery, a German, one of Fremont’s staff, rode suddenly up to the cavalry, exclaiming, in loud and excited terms, “Pring up de shackasses! Pring up de shackasses! For Cot’s sake, hurry up de shackasses, im-me-di-ate-ly!”

The necessity of this order, though not quite apparent, will be more obvious when it is remembered that “shackasses” are mules, carry mountain howitzers, which are fired from the backs of that much-abused but valuable animal; and the immediate occasion for the “shackasses” was that two regiments of rebel infantry were at that moment discovered ascending a hill immediately behind our batteries.

The “shackasses,” with the howitzers loaded with grape and canister, were soon on the ground.

The mules squared themselves, as they well knew how, for the shock.

A terrific volley was poured into the advancing column, which immediately broke and retreated.

Two hundred and seventy-eight dead bodies were found in the ravine next day, piled closely together as they fell, the effects of that volley from the backs of the “shackasses.”

JOKE WAS ON LINCOLN.

Mr. Lincoln enjoyed a joke at his own expense. Said he: “In the days when I used to be in the circuit, I was accosted in the cars by a stranger, who said, ‘Excuse me, sir, but I have an article in my possession which belongs to you.’ ‘How is that?’ I asked, considerably astonished.

“The stranger took a jackknife from his pocket. ‘This knife,’ said he, ‘was placed in my hands some years ago, with the injunction that I was to keep it until I had found a man uglier than myself. I have carried it from that time to this. Allow me to say, sir, that I think you are fairly entitled to the property.’”

THE OTHER ONE WAS WORSE.

It so happened that an official of the War Department had escaped serious punishment for a rather flagrant offense, by showing where grosser irregularities existed in the management of a certain bureau of the Department. So valuable was the information furnished that the culprit who “gave the snap away” was not even discharged.

“That reminds me,” the President said, when the case was laid before him, “of a story about Daniel Webster, when the latter was a boy.

“When quite young, at school, Daniel was one day guilty of a gross violation of the rules. He was detected in the act, and called up by the teacher for punishment.

“This was to be the old-fashioned ‘feruling’ of the hand. His hands happened to be very dirty.

“Knowing this, on the way to the teacher’s desk, he spit upon the palm of his right hand, wiping it off upon the side of his pantaloons.

“‘Give me your hand, sir,’ said the teacher, very sternly.

“Out went the right hand, partly cleansed. The teacher looked at it a moment, and said:

“‘Daniel, if you will find another hand in this school-room as filthy as that, I will let you off this time!’

“Instantly from behind the back came the left hand.

“‘Here it is, sir,’ was the ready reply.

“‘That will do,’ said the teacher, ‘for this time; you can take your seat, sir.’”

“I’D A BEEN MISSED BY MYSE’F.”

The President did not consider that every soldier who ran away in battle, or did not stand firmly to receive a bayonet charge, was a coward. He was of opinion that self-preservation was the first law of Nature, but he didn’t want this statute construed too liberally by the troops.

At the same time he took occasion to illustrate a point he wished to make by a story in connection with a darky who was a member of the Ninth Illinois Infantry Regiment. This regiment was one of those engaged at the capture of Fort Donelson. It behaved gallantly, and lost as heavily as any.

“Upon the hurricane-deck of one of our gunboats,” said the President in telling the story, “I saw an elderly darky, with a very philosophical and retrospective cast of countenance, squatted upon his bundle, toasting his shins against the chimney, and apparently plunged into a state of profound meditation.

“As the negro rather interested me, I made some inquiries, and found that he had really been with the Ninth Illinois Infantry at Donelson. and began to ask him some questions about the capture of the place.

“‘Were you in the fight?’

“‘Had a little taste of it, sa.’

“‘Stood your ground, did you?’

“‘No, sa, I runs.’

“‘Run at the first fire, did you?

“‘Yes, sa, and would hab run soona, had I knowd it war comin’.”

“‘Why, that wasn’t very creditable to your courage.’

“‘Dat isn’t my line, sa--cookin’s my profeshun.’

“‘Well, but have you no regard for your reputation?’

“‘Reputation’s nuffin to me by de side ob life.’

“‘Do you consider your life worth more than other people’s?’

“‘It’s worth more to me, sa.’

“‘Then you must value it very highly?’

“‘Yes, sa, I does, more dan all dis wuld, more dan a million ob dollars, sa, for what would dat be wuth to a man wid de bref out ob him? Self-preserbation am de fust law wid me.’

“‘But why should you act upon a different rule from other men?’

“‘Different men set different values on their lives; mine is not in de market.’

“‘But if you lost it you would have the satisfaction of knowing that you died for your country.’

“‘Dat no satisfaction when feelin’s gone.’

“‘Then patriotism and honor are nothing to you?’

“‘Nufin whatever, sat--I regard them as among the vanities.’

“‘If our soldiers were like you, traitors might have broken up the government without resistance.’

“‘Yes, sa, dar would hab been no help for it. I wouldn’t put my life in de scale ‘g’inst any gobernment dat eber existed, for no gobernment could replace de loss to me.’

“‘Do you think any of your company would have missed you if you had been killed?’

“‘Maybe not, sa--a dead white man ain’t much to dese sogers, let alone a dead nigga--but I’d a missed myse’f, and dat was de p’int wid me.’

“I only tell this story,” concluded the President, “in order to illustrate the result of the tactics of some of the Union generals who would be sadly ‘missed’ by themselves, if no one else, if they ever got out of the Army.”

IT ALL “DEPENDED” UPON THE EFFECT.

President Lincoln and some members of his Cabinet were with a part of the Army some distance south of the National Capital at one time, when Secretary of War Stanton remarked that just before he left Washington he had received a telegram from General Mitchell, in Alabama. General Mitchell asked instructions in regard to a certain emergency that had arisen.

The Secretary said he did not precisely understand the emergency as explained by General Mitchell, but had answered back, “All right; go ahead.”

“Now,” he said, as he turned to Mr. Lincoln, “Mr. President, if I have made an error in not understanding him correctly, I will have to get you to countermand the order.”

“Well,” exclaimed President Lincoln, “that is very much like the happening on the occasion of a certain horse sale I remember that took place at the cross-roads down in Kentucky, when I was a boy.

“A particularly fine horse was to be sold, and the people in large numbers had gathered together. They had a small boy to ride the horse up and down while the spectators examined the horse’s points.

“At last one man whispered to the boy as he went by: ‘Look here, boy, hain’t that horse got the splints?’

“The boy replied: ‘Mister, I don’t know what the splints is, but if it’s good for him, he has got it; if it ain’t good for him, he ain’t got it.’

“Now,” said President Lincoln, “if this was good for Mitchell, it was all right; but if it was not, I have got to countermand it.”

TOO SWIFT TO STAY IN THE ARMY.

There were strange, queer, odd things and happenings in the Army at times, but, as a rule, the President did not allow them to worry him. He had enough to bother about.

A quartermaster having neglected to present his accounts in proper shape, and the matter being deemed of sufficient importance to bring it to the attention of the President, the latter remarked:

“Now this instance reminds me of a little story I heard only a short time ago. A certain general’s purse was getting low, and he said it was probable he might be obliged to draw on his banker for some money.

“‘How much do you want, father?’ asked his son, who had been with him a few days.

“‘I think I shall send for a couple of hundred,’ replied the general.

“Why, father,’ said his son, very quietly, ‘I can let you have it.’

“‘You can let me have it! Where did you get so much money?

“‘I won it playing draw-poker with your staff, sir!’ replied the youth.

“The earliest morning train bore the young man toward his home, and I’ve been wondering if that boy and that quartermaster had happened to meet at the same table.”

ADMIRED THE STRONG MAN.

Governor Hoyt of Wisconsin tells a story of Mr. Lincoln’s great admiration for physical strength. Mr. Lincoln, in 1859, made a speech at the Wisconsin State Agricultural Fair. After the speech, in company with the Governor, he strolled about the grounds, looking at the exhibits. They came to a place where a professional “strong man” was tossing cannon balls in the air and catching them on his arms and juggling with them as though they were light as baseballs. Mr. Lincoln had never before seen such an exhibition, and he was greatly surprised and interested.

When the performance was over, Governor Hoyt, seeing Mr. Lincoln’s interest, asked him to go up and be introduced to the athlete. He did so, and, as he stood looking down musingly on the man, who was very short, and evidently wondering that one so much smaller than he could be so much stronger, he suddenly broke out with one of his quaint speeches. “Why,” he said, “why, I could lick salt off the top of your hat.”

WISHED THE ARMY CHARGED LIKE THAT.

A prominent volunteer officer who, early in the War, was on duty in Washington and often carried reports to Secretary Stanton at the War Department, told a characteristic story on President Lincoln. Said he:

“I was with several other young officers, also carrying reports to the War Department, and one morning we were late. In this instance we were in a desperate hurry to deliver the papers, in order to be able to catch the train returning to camp.

“On the winding, dark staircase of the old War Department, which many will remember, it was our misfortune, while taking about three stairs at a time, to run a certain head like a catapult into the body of the President, striking him in the region of the right lower vest pocket.

“The usual surprised and relaxed grunt of a man thus assailed came promptly.

“We quickly sent an apology in the direction of the dimly seen form, feeling that the ungracious shock was expensive, even to the humblest clerk in the department.

“A second glance revealed to us the President as the victim of the collision. Then followed a special tender of ‘ten thousand pardons,’ and the President’s reply:

“‘One’s enough; I wish the whole army would charge like that.’”

“UNCLE ABRAHAM” HAD EVERYTHING READY.

“You can’t do anything with them Southern fellows,” the old man at the table was saying.

“If they get whipped, they’ll retreat to them Southern swamps and bayous along with the fishes and crocodiles. You haven’t got the fish-nets made that’ll catch ‘em.”

“Look here, old gentleman,” remarked President Lincoln, who was sitting alongside, “we’ve got just the nets for traitors, in the bayous or anywhere.”

“Hey? What nets?”

“Bayou-nets!” and “Uncle Abraham” pointed his joke with his fork, spearing a fishball savagely.

NOT AS SMOOTH AS HE LOOKED.

Mr. Lincoln’s skill in parrying troublesome questions was wonderful. Once he received a call from Congressman John Ganson, of Buffalo, one of the ablest lawyers in New York, who, although a Democrat, supported all of Mr. Lincoln’s war measures. Mr. Ganson wanted explanations. Mr. Ganson was very bald with a perfectly smooth face. He had a most direct and aggressive way of stating his views or of demanding what he thought he was entitled to. He said: “Mr. Lincoln, I have supported all of your measures and think I am entitled to your confidence. We are voting and acting in the dark in Congress, and I demand to know--think I have the right to ask and to know--what is the present situation, and what are the prospects and conditions of the several campaigns and armies.”

Mr. Lincoln looked at him critically for a moment and then said: “Ganson, how clean you shave!”

Most men would have been offended, but Ganson was too broad and intelligent a man not to see the point and retire at once, satisfied, from the field.

A SMALL CROP.

Chauncey M. Depew says that Mr. Lincoln told him the following story, which he claimed was one of the best two things he ever originated: He was trying a case in Illinois where he appeared for a prisoner charged with aggravated assault and battery. The complainant had told a horrible story of the attack, which his appearance fully justified, when the District Attorney handed the witness over to Mr. Lincoln, for cross-examination. Mr. Lincoln said he had no testimony, and unless he could break down the complainant’s story he saw no way out. He had come to the conclusion that the witness was a bumptious man, who rather prided himself upon his smartness in repartee and, so, after looking at him for some minutes, he said:

“Well, my friend, how much ground did you and my client here fight over?”

The fellow answered: “About six acres.”

“Well,” said Mr. Lincoln, “don’t you think that this is an almighty small crop of fight to gather from such a big piece of ground?”

The jury laughed. The Court and District-Attorney and complainant all joined in, and the case was laughed out of court.

“NEVER REGRET WHAT YOU DON’T WRITE.”

A simple remark one of the party might make would remind Mr. Lincoln of an apropos story.

Secretary of the Treasury Chase happened to remark, “Oh, I am so sorry that I did not write a letter to Mr. So-and-so before I left home!”

President Lincoln promptly responded:

“Chase, never regret what you don’t write; it is what you do write that you are often called upon to feel sorry for.”

A VAIN GENERAL.

In an interview between President Lincoln and Petroleum V. Nasby, the name came up of a recently deceased politician of Illinois whose merit was blemished by great vanity. His funeral was very largely attended.

“If General ---- had known how big a funeral he would have had,” said Mr. Lincoln, “he would have died years ago.”

DEATH BED REPENTANCE.

A Senator, who was calling upon Mr. Lincoln, mentioned the name of a most virulent and dishonest official; one, who, though very brilliant, was very bad.

“It’s a good thing for B----” said Mr. Lincoln, “that there is such a thing as a deathbed repentance.”

NO CAUSE FOR PRIDE.

A member of Congress from Ohio came into Mr. Lincoln’s presence in a state of unutterable intoxication, and sinking into a chair, exclaimed in tones that welled up fuzzy through the gallon or more of whiskey that he contained, “Oh, ‘why should (hic) the spirit of mortal be proud?’”

“My dear sir,” said the President, regarding him closely, “I see no reason whatever.”

THE STORY OF LINCOLN’S LIFE

When Abraham Lincoln once was asked to tell the story of his life, he replied:

“It is contained in one line of Gray’s ‘Elegy in a Country Churchyard’:

“‘The short and simple annals of the poor.’”

That was true at the time he said it, as everything else he said was Truth, but he was then only at the beginning of a career that was to glorify him as one of the heroes of the world, and place his name forever beside the immortal name of the mighty Washington.

Many great men, particularly those of America, began life in humbleness and poverty, but none ever came from such depths or rose to such a height as Abraham Lincoln.

His birthplace, in Hardin county, Kentucky, was but a wilderness, and Spencer county, Indiana, to which the Lincoln family removed when Abraham was in his eighth year, was a wilder and still more uncivilized region.

The little red schoolhouse which now so thickly adorns the country hillside had not yet been built. There were scattered log schoolhouses, but they were few and far between. In several of these Mr. Lincoln got the rudiments of an education--an education that was never finished, for to the day of his death he was a student and a seeker after knowledge.

Some records of his schoolboy days are still left us. One is a book made and bound by Lincoln himself, in which he had written the table of weights and measures, and the sums to be worked out therefrom. This was his arithmetic, for he was too poor to own a printed copy.

A YOUTHFUL POET.

On one of the pages of this quaint book he had written these four lines of schoolboy doggerel: