debts. You must appeal to the courts in regular order."

When she was gone, Mr. Lincoln sat down, crossed his legs, locked his hands over his knees, and commenced to laughthis being his favorite attitude when much amused.

latter, Dr. M'C. asked the President if there was any truth in the rumor, at that time quite prevalent, of the removal of Mr. Dayton, American Minister at the French Court, and, if there was, he, Dr. M'C., would like the privilege of discussing the matter a little. President Lincoln said: "As to discussing the matter I have no objection, but as to his removal I have no such idea." He then went on to speak of his reason for appointing Mr. Dayton. you believe, Major, that the old lady who has just left, came in here to get from me

and said:

"What odd kinds of people come in to see me," he said; "and what odd ideas they must have about my office! Would

"She may have come in here a loyal woman," continued Mr. Lincoln, "but I'll be bound she has gone away believing that the worst pictures of me in the Richmond press only lack truth in not being half black and bad enough."

"When I was a member of Congress, an order for stopping the pay of a Treasin 1846-7, after the close of the Mexican ury clerk, who owes her a board bill of war, a treaty was made, and opposed by about seventy dollars!" (And the PresiDaniel Webster. After Daniel Webster dent rocked himself backward and forsat down, William L. Dayton arose and ward, and appeared intensely amused.) made a speech that covered every point that Webster had made. I had been in the habit of regarding Webster as the greatest and most eloquent of men, until Mr. Dayton made that speech (and then with a peculiar humor that belongs to all great natures, Mr. Lincoln added): It may be because Mr. Dayton was on my side that I thought it was a great speech; and one of my first thoughts after my election was that William L. Dayton should occupy one of the best appointments I could give him."

This anecdote shows how tenaciously Mr. Lincoln clung to men he believed to be reliable, remembering that speech and its maker fifteen years.

"Public Opinion Baths." Colonel Halpine, one of General Halleck's staff, relates that once, on what was called "a public day"-when Mr. Lincoln received all applicants in their turn-the first thing he saw on being ushered into the President's chamber by Major Hay, was Mr. Lincoln bowing an elderly lady out of the door, the President's remarks to her being, as she still lingered and appeared reluctant to go,

This led to a somewhat general conversation, in which surprise was expressed that the President did not adopt the plan in vogue at all military head-quarters, under which every applicant to see the General commanding had to be filtered through a sieve of officers-assistant Adjutant Generals, and so forth,-who allowed none in to take up the General's time, save such as they were satisfied had business of sufficient importance, and which could be transacted in no other manner than by a personal interview. Colonel Halpine re

marked

"Of every hundred people who come to see the General-in-chief daily, not ten have any sufficient business with him, nor are they admitted. On being asked to explain for what purpose they desire to see him, and stating it, it is found in nine cases out of ten, that the business properly belongs to some one or other of the subordinate bureaux. They are then referred, as the case may be, to the quartermaster, commissary, medical, adjutant general, or other departments,

"I am really very sorry, madam; very sorry. But your own good sense must tell you that I am not here to collect small with an assurance that—even if they saw

the General-in-chief-he could do nothing | my perceptions of responsibility and duty. more for them than give them the same It would never do for a President to have direction. With these points courteously guards with drawn sabres at his door, as explained, they go away quite content, if he fancied he were, or were trying to although refused admittance." be, or were assuming to be, an emperor."

"Ah, yes," replied Mr. Lincoln, gravely That original phrase of the President's, -and his words on this matter are import-" public opinion baths," is not likely ever ant as illustrating a rule of his action, to be forgotten.

and to some extent, perhaps, the essential

coln's Desk.

ly representative character of his mind Pamphlet of Jokes in the Corner of Mr. Linand of his administration-" ah, yes! such things do very well for you military peo- In a corner of his desk, Mr. Lincoln ple, with your arbitrary rule, and in your was accustomed to keep a copy of some camps. But the office of President is humorous work, and it was frequently his essentially a civil one, and the affair is habit, when greatly fatigued, annoyed, or very different. For myself, I feel-though depressed, to take this up and read a chapthe tax on my time is heavy-that no ter, with great relief. The Saturday behours of my day are better employed than fore he left Washington to go to the front, those which thus bring me again within just previous to the capture of Richmond, the direct contact and atmosphere of the had been a very hard day with him. The average of our whole people. Men mov-pressure of office-seekers was greater at ing only in an official circle are apt to be- that juncture than ever before, and he was come merely official-not to say arbitrary almost worn out. Among the callers that —in their ideas, and are apter and apter, evening, was a party composed of a senawith each passing day, to forget that they tor, a representative, an ex-lieutenant govonly hold power in a representative capac- ernor of a western State, and several priity. Now this is all wrong. I go into vate citizens. They had business of great these promiscuous receptions of all who importance, involving the necessity of the claim to have business with me, twice each President's examination of voluminous week, and every applicant for audience has documents. Pushing everything aside, he to take his turn, as if waiting to be shaved said to one of the partyin a barber's shop. Many of the matters "Have you seen the Nasby papers?" brought to my notice are utterly frivolous, "No, I have not-who is Nasby?" but others are of more or less importance, "There is a chap out in Ohio," returned and all serve to renew in me a clearer and the President, "who has been writing a more vivid image of that great popular series of letters in the newspapers under assemblage out of which I sprang, and to the signature of Petroleum V. Nasby. which at the end of two years I must re- Some one sent me a pamphlet collection turn. I tell you, Major," he said,-ap- of them the other day. I am going to pearing at this point to recollect that Hal- write to 'Petroleum' to come down here, pine was in the room, for the former part and I intend to tell him if he will commuof these remarks had been made with half-nicate his talent to me, I will swap places shut eyes, as if in soliloquy-"I tell you with him!" Thereupon he arose, went to that I call these receptions my public opin- a drawer in his desk, and, taking out the ion baths for I have little time to read "letters," he sat down and read one to the the papers and gather public opinion that company, finding in their enjoyment of it way; and though they may not be pleas- the temporary excitement and relief which ant in all their particulars, the effect, as a another man, perhaps, would have found whole, is renovating and invigorating to in a glass of grog! The instant he had

ceased, the book was thrown aside, his woman saw it in that light and wept. countenance relapsed into its habitual se- Justice survived, while mercy lay stricken rious expression, and the business was en- to the ground by those most in need of its tered upon with the utmost earnestness. benefit.

Justice surviving Clemency.

Polly's Baby.

One of the officers employed in investi- In a rather plain frame building in gating the plot of the murder of the Pres- Raleigh, North Carolina, Andrew Johnident had occasion to question a woman son, President of the United States, was who was in some way connected with the born. The house is shown to visitors by

66

the owner, a venera-
ble old lady named.
Stewart. She will
also tell how, in an
ecstacy of delight,
on returning from
her wedding tour, the
first news she got
was, Polly has a
baby." Full of the
feelings and enthusi-
asm of a young bride,
she rushed in and
kissed and hugged
the baby."
"Little I
thought," she ex-
claimed to a visitor,
"that I was caress-
ing the future Pres-

affair. She kept flippantly asserting that ident of the United States." "You, then,

"S'help me heaven I don't know anything knew his father and mother?" "Yes, about it, and s'help me heaven, I don't tell Sir, I knew them well; they were in our an untruth, for I never told a lie in my employ for several years." "How did life," keeping on in her voluble assertions they serve you?" "They were plain, hardtill at length the officer quietly interrupted working, honest folks, that attended to her with the assurance that it did not much their business and nothing more." When matter to him what she revealed, but it leaving, the old lady said to her company, might be better for her, at which she be-"How I would like to see him, dear me; came a little indignant, and asked what only it is so far; but then he would not they could do with her if she knew about know me. Well, any way, I should like the matter and wouldn't tell it. "Why," to see; I think he would grant me one litresponded the officer, "in case you prove tle request. I have a grandson in prison to be implicated as much as I am afraid in the North, perhaps he'd let him come you are, you might be hanged." At this home to gladden my old heart-would you reply she was a trifle moved, and said, mention it to him, Sir?" "Justice should be tempered with clemency." "Ah, yes, my dear madam," replied the officer, "but you forget that the clemency man is dead." For the first time the

Pocket-Full of Coin Ready for Delivery.

The words "Honest Old Abe" have passed into the language of our time and

country as the synonym for all that is just in disguise and embark from Portland to and honest in man. Yet thousands of in- a foreign port. The President, as usual, stances, unknown to the world, might be was disposed to be merciful and to permit added to those so often told of Mr. Lin- the arch traitor to pass unmolested. The coln's great and crowning virtue. He dis- Secretary, however, urged that he should liked inuendoes, concealments, and subter- be arrested as a traitor, saying: fuges; and no sort of approach at official "By permitting him to escape the pen"jobbing" ever had any encouragement alties of treason, you sanction it." from him. He steadily discountenanced all practices of government officers using tell you a story. There was an Irish solany part of the public funds for temporary or personal purposes; and he loved to tell of an instance in his own official experience, when he was saved from embarrassment by his rigid adherence to a good rule.

"Well," replied Mr. Lincoln, "let me

dier here last summer who wanted something to drink stronger than water, and stopped at a drug shop, where he espied a soda fountain. "Mr. Doctor,' said he, give me, plase, a glass of soda wather, an' if yees can put in a few dhrops of He had been postmaster at Salem, Illi- whiskey unbeknown to meself, I'll be nois, during Jackson's administration, Wil- obleeged.' Now," continued Mr. Lincoln, liam T. Barry being then Postmaster-Gen- "if Jake Thompson is permitted to go eral, and resigning his office, removed to through Maine unbeknown to meself, Springfield, having sent a statement of ac- what's the harm? So don't have him arcounts to the Department at Washington. rested." No notice was taken of his account, which Similar was the logic employed by Mr. showed a balance due the Government of Lincoln, it appears, in the case of Jefferover one hundred and fifty dollars, until son Davis. General Sherman, in vindicathree or four years after, when, Amos Ken- ting himself against what he regarded as dall being Postmaster-General, he was the hostile course of the War Department, presented with a draft for the amount due. said that the Government never distinctly Some of Mr. Lincoln's friends, who knew explained to him the policy which should that he was in straightened circumstances guide his actions, and that at City Point then, as he had always been, heard of the he had asked Mr. Lincoln whether he draft and offered to help him out with a wanted Jefferson Davis captured, and for loan; but he told them not to worry, and reply had been told a story. This story producing from his trunk an old pocket, is the one, substantially, which Mr. Lintied up and marked, counted out in six-coln had employed in the case narrated pences, shillings, and quarters, the exact sum required of him, in the identical coin which he received while in office years before, and which he had sacredly reserved for the Government, whenever the proper official should be pleased to respond to his "account rendered."

above, but its use in connection with Davis, and its repetition by General Sherman, under the circumstances referred to, give it in some measure a historical value.

"I'll tell you, General," Mr. Lincoln is said to have begun, "I'll tell you what I think about taking Jefferson Davis. Out in Sangamon County there was an old Answering the Secretary and the General. temperance lecturer who was very strict One of the last stories told by Presi- in the doctrine and practice of total abstident Lincoln, was to one of the members nence. One day, after a long ride in the of his cabinet who went to see him, to ask hot sun, he stopped at the house of a if it would be a proper proceeding to per- friend, who proposed making him a lemmit Jake Thompson to slip through Maine onade. As the mild beverage was being

mixed, the friend insinuatingly asked if he | I noticed that one of the faces was a little wouldn't like just the least drop of some- paler, say five shades, than the other. I thing stronger to brace up his nerves after got up and the thing melted away, and I. the exhausting heat and exercise. 'No,' | went off, and, in the excitement of the replied the lecturer, I couldn't think of hour, forgot all about it-nearly, but not it; I'm opposed to it on principle. But,' quite, for the thing would once in a while he added, with a longing glance at the come up, and give me a little pang, as black bottle that stood conveniently at though something uncomfortable had haphand, ‘if you could manage to put in a pened. A few days after, I tried the exdrop unbeknownst to me, I guess it would periment again, when [with a laugh.] sure not hurt me much.' Now, General," Mr. enough, the thing came back again; but I Lincoln is said to have concluded, "I'm never succeeded in bringing the ghost back bound to oppose the escape of Jeff. Davis; after that, though I once tried very indusbut if you could manage to let him slip triously to show it to my wife, who was out unbeknownst-like, I guess it wouldn't worried about it somewhat. She thought hurt me much." it was a 'sign' that I was to be elected to "And that," exclaimed General Sher- a second term of office, and that the paleman, " is all I could get out of the Gov-ness of one of the faces was an omen that ernment as to what its policy was concern- I should not see life through the last ing the rebel leaders."

term."

The President, with his usual good sense, saw nothing in all this but an optical illusion; though the flavor of superstition which hangs about every man's composition made him wish that he had never seen it. But there are people who will now believe that this odd coincidence was "a warning," notwithstanding its entire consistency with the laws of nature.

Second Reflection in the Looking Glass. When Mr. Lincoln received the news of his first election, he went home to tell Tenth of May at Irwinsville. Mrs. Lincoln about it. She was up stairs On arriving at General Johnston's headin the bed-room, and there he went, throw-quarters, and learning of the terms of the ing himself down on a lounge, in a care- convention between Sherman and Johnless manner. "Opposite where I lay," ston, Jefferson Davis, then on his flight said Mr. Lincoln, "was a bureau, with a South from Richmond, stopped at Charswinging glass upon it," and here in re- lotte, N. C. It was frequently remarked lating the matter to a friend he got up and that it was dangerous to do so; but he inplaced the furniture so as to illustrate the variably replied that he had two many position and, looking in that glass, I friends, and knew the country two well, saw myself reflected, nearly at full length, to be caught by any of the forces in the but my face, I noticed, had two separate Yankee army. He remained at Charlotte and distinct images, the tip of the nose of until twelve o'clock on the day that the one being about three inches from the tip armistice expired. At eleven o'clock on of the other. I was a little bothered, per- that day, his horse, a handsome blooded haps startled, and got up and looked in the bay, was brought to the door of the priglass, but the illusion vanished. On lying vate house in which he was stopping. At down again, I saw it a second time- twelve, having learned that the terms of plainer, if possible, than before; and then the aforesaid convention were rejected, he