Part 37 (1/2)

He had the room cleared and discussed the war, interspersing the dialogue with apposite stories.--(Told by Senator C. M. Depew.)

”ACCUSE NOT A SERVANT----”

As the possibilities of rapid advancement were redoubled during the war, the President, in his first term of office, was stormed by the office-seekers, who thought it the best plan to have occupiers of posts ousted to give them an opening; so they maligned and even accused chief officials with a freedom unknown in other countries where the bureaucracy is a sacred inst.i.tution--as within a generation it has become here. Lincoln rebuked one of these covetous vexers by saying gravely to him:

”Friend, go home and attentively read 'Proverbs,' chapter thirteen, verse ten.”

The rebuffed applicant found at that page in the book: ”Accuse not a servant to his master, lest he curse thee, and thou be found guilty!”--(Attested by Schuyler Colfax.)

A WOLF IN A TRAP MUST SACRIFICE HIS ”TAIL” TO BE FREE.

The presidential private secretary, Stoddard, maintains that his chief sorely astonished and baffled the tribe of acquaintances who flocked in upon him as soon as he was elevated and went back home, with empty haversacks, wondering that he ignored them with heartless ingrat.i.tude.

”He did not make even his own father a brigadier nor invite cousin Dennis Hanks to a seat in his Cabinet!”

SOMEWHAT OF A NEWSMAN.

Innately attached to letters, and precocious, Abraham Lincoln soon learned his letters and drank in all the learning that his few books could supply. Hence at an early age he became the oracle on the rude frontier, where even a smattering made him handy and valuable to the illiterate backwoodsmen. Besides, as working at any place and at any work, he rarely abided long in any one spot, and had not what might be called a home in his teens.

Dennis Hanks, his cousin, said of Abraham, at fourteen to eighteen: ”Abe was a good talker, a good reader, and a kind of newsboy.” Hence he was a sort of volunteer colporteur distributing gossip, as a notion pedler, before he was a store clerk where centered all the local news.

It was on this experience that he would mingle with the newspaper reporters and telegraph men fraternally, saying with his winning smile and undeniable ”push”:

”Let me in, boys, for I am somewhat of a news-gatherer myself.”

And then he would fix his footing by one of his stories, always--well, often--uttered with a view to publication.

”A LITTLE MORE LIGHT AND A LITTLE LESS NOISE.”

As the President was a diligent devourer of the newspaper in the vexatious times (as at all others), he met many a torrent of criticism, incitement, and counsels which left him stunned rather than alleviated. To a special correspondent who hampered him, he said:

”Your papers remind me of a little story. There was a gentleman traveling on horseback in the West where the roads were few and bad and no settlements. He lost his way. To make matters worse, as night came on, a terrible thunder-storm arose; lightning dazzled the eye or thunder shook the earth. Frightened, he got off and led his horse, seeking to guide himself by the spasmodic and flickering electric light. All of a sudden, a tremendous crash brought the man in terror to his knees, when he stammered:

”'Oh, Lord! if it be the same to Thee, give us a little more light and a little less noise!'”