"THE SWEARING HAD TO BE DONE THEN, OR NOT AT ALL!"
An old man came from Tennessee to beg the life of his son, death-doomed under the military code. General Fiske procured him admittance to the President, who took the petition and promised to attend to the matter. But the applicant, in anguish, insisted that a life was at stake--that to-morrow would not do, and that the decision must be made on the instant.
Lincoln assumed his mollifying air, and in a soothing tone brought out his universal soothing-sirup, the little story:
"It was General Fiske, who introduced you, who told me this. The general began his career as a colonel, and raised his regiment in Missouri. Having good principles, he made the boys promise then not to be profane, but let him do all the swearing for the regiment. For months no violation of the agreement was reported. But one day a teamster, with the foul tongue associated with their calling and mule-driving, as he drove his team through a longer and deeper series of mud-puddles than ever before, unable to restrain himself, turned himself inside out as a vocal Vesuvius. It happened, too, that this torrent was heard surging by the colonel, who called him to account.
"'Well, yes, colonel,' he acknowledged, 'I did vow to let you do all the swearing of the regiment; but the cold fact is, that the swearing had to be done thar and then, or not at all, to do the 'casion justice--and you were not thar!'
"Now," summed up Mr. Lincoln to the engrossed and semiconsoled parent, "I may not be there, so do you take this and do the swearing him off!"
He furnished him with the release autograph, and sent another mourner on his way rejoicing.