The Lincoln Story Book by Henry L. Williams

H >> Henry L. Williams >> The Lincoln Story Book

Pages:
1 | 2 | 3 | 4 | 5 | 6 | 7 | 8 | 9 | 10 | 11 | 12 | 13 | 14 | 15 | 16 | 17 | 18

The story is repeated with his second Vice substituted for the first,
with the more justification, as "Andy" Johnson was impeached for his
incompetency. Detective Baker put it this way: "As to the crazy folks,
I must take my chances. The most crazy people being, I fear, some of
my own too zealous adherents."

(He had the same idea as in an ancient Chinese proverb: "You may steal
the captain out of his castle, but you cannot steal the castle.")

"I am but a single individual, and it would not help their cause, or
make the least difference in the progress of the war." [Footnote: He
might have said, as truly as his predecessor, John Tyler, reproached
also for going about unguarded: "My body-guard is the people who
elected me."]--(Cited by F. B. Carpenter.)

* * * * *

THE FEARLESSNESS OF THE GOD-FEARING.

Lincoln said that by the death of his son Willie he was touched; by
the victory of Gettysburg made a believer. It is plain that, after
this, a fortitude replaced the despondency stamping him. It may be
due to this conviction of being one of the chosen, like Cromwell
and Gordon, soldiers of Christ, that he met all adjurations for
him to take care of his precious life with fanatical unconcern. He
communicated to the Cabinet, at the close of the conflict, how he had
appointed to confer alone and without guards to terrify the emissary,
a noted Confederate. They were to discuss peace--and by that word,
Lincoln was drawn to any one. He answered the cautions with the simple
saying:

"I am but an individual, and my removal will not in any way advance
the other folks in their endeavors."

In fact, it was so--the misdeed was a double-edged blade which cut
both ways. It will never be known, probably, how near a massacre
followed the explosion of indignation at that maniac's murder of the
Emancipator. Fortunately for the unsullied robe of Columbia, a hundred
advocates of leaving retribution to Heaven echoed Garfield's appeasing
address.

Lincoln met the intermediator, but the ultimate negotiation fell
through, like the others all. He came home from City Point with
sadness, but from his seed has outcome the Universal Peace Tribunal
of The Hague. Professor Martens based his original plea of the czar's
on the Lincolnian guide for the soldiers in our war.

* * * * *

THE POISONING PLOT.

A servant at the White House testifies that he was approached by
emissaries who offered him a sum almost preposterously large to put
a powder in the milk for the Lincoln family's table. The agents knew
that they were temperance followers, milk being as common as wine at
previous tenants' table. This was laughed at before the shadow of
Booth's patricide was cast ahead. But the Reverend Henry Ward Beecher
publicly declares--and he was in the state secrets as deeply as any
layman--that President-General Harrison, "Tippecanoe," was poisoned
that Tyler might fulfil the plan to annex Texas as a slave State.
"With even stronger convictions is it affirmed that President-General
Taylor was poisoned, that a less stern successor might give a suppler
instrument to manage. Who doubts now that it was attempted
Breckenridge in his room?"

* * * * *

NOTHING LIKE GETTING USED TO THINGS!

The more evident it grew that the President, at whom the stupid jeers
persisted through incurable density of his enemies, was the vital
motor of the Union cause, than threats of violently removing him were
continually sent him. So many such letters accumulated that he grimly
packeted them together and labeled the mass: "Assassination Papers."
It was a Damoclesian dagger of which he spoke lightly, because fear of
death never awed him. When a man walks in the manifest path traced out
for him by Heaven, he does not tremble. But friends, more concerned
by the strain in watching over his safety, expressing surprise at his
indifference, he tried to reassure them:

"Oh, there is nothing like getting used to things!"

* * * * *

MOST AFRAID OF A FRIENDLY SHOT.

General Wadsworth, in his anxiety about the President's safety in
Washington, swarming with insurgent agents, set a cavalry guard over
the President's carriage. He went and complained to General Halleck,
in charge of the capital, saying only partly facetiously:

"Why, Mrs. Lincoln and I cannot hear ourselves talk for the clatter of
their sabers and spurs; and some of them appear to be new hands and
very awkward, so that I am more afraid of being shot by the accidental
discharge of a carbine or revolver than of any attempt upon my life by
a roving squad of 'Jeb' Stuart's cavalry."

(Since Stuart came twenty miles within the Union lines, he was the
criterion of rebel raiders' possibilities.)

* * * * *

THE ONE WORD HE HAD LEARNED.

A tale-bearer came to the President with a plot against him and the
government, which was a cock-and-bull without any adherence, and all
superficial. Lincoln heard him out, but then sharply returned:

"There is one thing that I have learned, and that you have not. It
is only one word: 'Thorough!'" Then bringing his huge hand down on
the table-desk, to emphasize his meaning, he repeated: "Thorough!"

* * * * *

NOT TO DISAPPOINT THE PEOPLE.

The strictly religious went so far as to call the Lincoln
assassination a judgment(!), as it happened in a playhouse on a Good
Friday! It appears that the President had compunctions, and at the
last moment was disinclined to go, though a party had been made up
to oblige a young espoused couple; but General Grant, who was to be
a feature of the commanded performance, was called away--no doubt
escaping the knife the murderer had in reserve to his pistol. The
President said that he must go, not to disappoint the people on this
gala night, as the rejoicing was wide over the dissolution of the
Confederacy.

* * * * *

NOTHING LIKE PRAYER--BUT PRAISE.

In 1862, the President suffered "an affliction harder to bear than
the war!" His son Willie (William, next to one that died in infancy)
was carried off by typhoid fever, under the presidential roof; and
another, "Tad," (Thomas, who actually lived to be twenty and passed
away in Illinois) was given up by the physicians. At this crisis Miss
Dix, daughter of the general famous for his order: "If any one offers
to pull down the American flag, shoot him on the spot," recommended
an army nurse, Mrs. Rebecca R. Pomeroy. She was a born succorer, pious
and fortifying. She came reluctantly to the important errand, as she
had to leave a wardful of wounded soldiers. She had lost many of her
family, and was able to comfort from gaging the affectionate father's
grief. She led him to pray in his double racking of bad war news and
the domestic distress.

On next seeing him and that he was less grieved, for news of the Fort
Donaldson surrender to General Grant arrived in the meantime, she
hastened to say:

"There is nothing like prayer, Mr. President!"

"Yes, there is: Praise! Prayer and praise must go together!"

THE END.

Pages:
1 | 2 | 3 | 4 | 5 | 6 | 7 | 8 | 9 | 10 | 11 | 12 | 13 | 14 | 15 | 16 | 17 | 18