MENACE TO THE GOVERNMENT.
The persistence of office-seekers nearly drove President Lincoln wild. They slipped in through the half-opened doors of the Executive Mansion; they dogged his steps if he walked; they edged their way through the crowds and thrust their papers in his hands when he rode; and, taking it all in all, they well-nigh worried him to death.
He once said that if the Government passed through the Rebellion without dismemberment there was the strongest danger of its falling a prey to the rapacity of the office-seeking class.
“This human struggle and scramble for office, for a way to live without work, will finally test the strength of our institutions,” were the words he used.
TROOPS COULDN’T FLY OVER IT.
On April 20th a delegation from Baltimore appeared at the White House and begged the President that troops for Washington be sent around and not through Baltimore.
President Lincoln replied, laughingly: “If I grant this concession, you will be back tomorrow asking that no troops be marched ‘around’ it.”
The President was right. That afternoon, and again on Sunday and Monday, committees sought him, protesting that Maryland soil should not be “polluted” by the feet of soldiers marching against the South.