Lincoln's Yarns and Stories Part 42

"If he saw any live, fighting Indians, it was more than I did, but I had a good many b.l.o.o.d.y struggles with the mosquitoes, and although I never fainted from loss of blood, I can truly say that I was often very hungry."

Lincoln concluded by saying that if he ever turned Democrat and should run for the Presidency, he hoped they would not make fun of him by attempting to make him a military hero.

"SURRENDER NO SLAVE."

About March, 1862, General Benjamin F. Butler, in command at Fortress Monroe, advised President Lincoln that he had determined to regard all slaves coming into his camps as contraband of war, and to employ their labor under fair compensation, and Secretary of War Stanton replied to him, in behalf of the President, approving his course, and saying, "You are not to interfere between master and slave on the one hand, nor surrender slaves who may come within your lines."

This was a significant milestone of progress to the great end that was thereafter to be reached.

CONSCRIPTING DEAD MEN.

Mr. Lincoln being found fault with for making another "call," said that if the country required it, he would continue to do so until the matter stood as described by a Western provost marshal, who says:

"I listened a short time since to a b.u.t.ternut-clad individual, who succeeded in making good his escape, expatiate most eloquently on the rigidness with which the conscription was enforced south of the Tennessee River. His response to a question propounded by a citizen ran somewhat in this wise:

"'Do they conscript close over the river?'

"'Stranger, I should think they did! They take every man who hasn't been dead more than two days!'

"If this is correct, the Confederacy has at least a ghost of a chance left."

And of another, a Methodist minister in Kansas, living on a small salary, who was greatly troubled to get his quarterly instalment. He at last told the non-paying trustees that he must have his money, as he was suffering for the necessaries of life.

"Money!" replied the trustees; "you preach for money? We thought you preached for the good of souls!"

"Souls!" responded the reverend; "I can't eat souls; and if I could it would take a thousand such as yours to make a meal!"

"That soul is the point, sir," said the President.

LINCOLN'S REJECTED Ma.n.u.sCRIPT.

On February 5th, 1865, President Lincoln formulated a message to Congress, proposing the payment of $400,000,000 to the South as compensation for slaves lost by emanc.i.p.ation, and submitted it to his Cabinet, only to be unanimously rejected.

Lincoln sadly accepted the decision, and filed away the ma.n.u.script message, together with this indors.e.m.e.nt thereon, to which his signature was added: "February 5, 1865. To-day these papers, which explain themselves, were drawn up and submitted to the Cabinet unanimously disapproved by them."

When the proposed message was disapproved, Lincoln soberly asked: "How long will the war last?"

To this none could make answer, and he added: "We are spending now, in carrying on the war, $3,000,000 a day, which will amount to all this money, besides all the lives."

LINCOLN AS A STORY WRITER.

In his youth, Mr. Lincoln once got an idea for a thrilling, romantic story. One day, in Springfield, he was sitting with his feet on the window sill, chatting with an acquaintance, when he suddenly changed the drift of the conversation by saying: "Did you ever write out a story in your mind? I did when I was a little codger. One day a wagon with a lady and two girls and a man broke down near us, and while they were fixing up, they cooked in our kitchen. The woman had books and read us stories, and they were the first I had ever heard. I took a great fancy to one of the girls; and when they were gone I thought of her a great deal, and one day when I was sitting out in the sun by the house I wrote out a story in my mind. I thought I took my father's horse and followed the wagon, and finally I found it, and they were surprised to see me. I talked with the girl, and persuaded her to elope with me; and that night I put her on my horse, and we started off across the prairie. After several hours we came to a camp; and when we rode up we found it was the one we had left a few hours before, and went in. The next night we tried again, and the same thing happened--the horse came back to the same place; and then we concluded that we ought not to elope. I stayed until I had persuaded her father to give her to me. I always meant to write that story out and publish it, and I began once; but I concluded that it was not much of a story. But I think that was the beginning of love with me."

LINCOLN'S IDEAS ON CROSSING A RIVER WHEN HE GOT TO IT.

Lincoln's reply to a Springfield (Illinois) clergyman, who asked him what was to be his policy on the slavery question was most apt:

"Well, your question is rather a cool one, but I will answer it by telling you a story:

"You know Father B., the old Methodist preacher? and you know Fox River and its freshets?

"Well, once in the presence of Father B., a young Methodist was worrying about Fox River, and expressing fears that he should be prevented from fulfilling some of his appointments by a freshet in the river.

"Father B. checked him in his gravest manner. Said he:

"'Young man, I have always made it a rule in my life not to cross Fox River till I get to it.'

"And," said the President, "I am not going to worry myself over the slavery question till I get to it."

A few days afterward a Methodist minister called on the President, and on being presented to him, said, simply:

"Mr. President, I have come to tell you that I think we have got to Fox River!"

Lincoln thanked the clergyman, and laughed heartily.

PRESIDENT NOMINATED FIRST.

The day of Lincoln's second nomination for the Presidency he forgot all about the Republican National Convention, sitting at Baltimore, and wandered over to the War Department. While there, a telegram came announcing the nomination of Johnson as Vice-President.

"What," said Lincoln to the operator, "do they nominate a Vice-President before they do a President?"

"Why," replied the astonished official, "have you not heard of your own nomination? It was sent to the White House two hours ago."

"It is all right," replied the President; "I shall probably find it on my return."

"THEM GILLITEENS."