Late one evening, the President brought in to see my picture his friend and biographer, the Hon. J. H. Barrett, and a Mr. M——, of Cincinnati. An allusion to a question of law in the course of conversation suggesting the subject, Mr. Lincoln said: “The strongest example of ‘rigid government’ and ‘close construction’ I ever knew, was that of Judge ——. It was once said of him that he would hang a man for blowing his nose in the street, but that he would quash the indictment if it failed to specify which hand he blew it with!”
A new levy of troops required, on a certain occasion, the appointment of a large additional number of brigadier and major-generals. Among the immense number of applications, Mr. Lincoln came upon one wherein the claims of a certain worthy (not in the service at all) for a generalship were glowingly set forth. But the applicant didn’t specify whether he wanted to be brigadier or major-general. The President observed this difficulty, and solved it by a lucid indorsement. The clerk, on receiving the paper again, found written across its back: “Major-General, I reckon. A. Lincoln.”
A juvenile “Brigadier” from New York, with a small detachment of cavalry, having imprudently gone within the Rebel lines near Fairfax Court House, was captured by “guerillas.” Upon the fact being reported to Mr. Lincoln, he said that he was very sorry to lose the horses!
“What do you mean?” inquired his informant.
“Why,” rejoined the President, “I can make a better ‘brigadier’ any day; but those horses cost the government a hundred and twenty-five dollars a head!”
Mr. Lincoln sometimes had a very effective way of dealing with men who troubled him with questions. A visitor once asked him how many men the Rebels had in the field. The President replied, very seriously, “Twelve hundred thousand, according to the best authority.” The interrogator blanched in the face, and ejaculated, “Good Heavens!” “Yes sir, twelve hundred thousand—no doubt of it. You see, all of our generals, when they get whipped, say the enemy outnumbers them from three or five to one, and I must believe them. We have four hundred thousand men in the field, and three times four make twelve. Don’t you see it?”
Some gentlemen were discussing in Mr. Lincoln’s presence on a certain occasion General McClellan’s military capacity. “It is doubtless true that he is a good ‘engineer,’” said the President; “but he seems to have a special talent for developing a ‘stationary’ engine.”
When Mr. Lincoln handed to his friend Gilbert his appointment as assessor in the Wall Street district, New York, he said: “Gilbert, from what I can learn, I judge that you are going upon good ‘missionary’ ground. Preach God and Liberty to the ‘bulls’ and ‘bears,’ and get all the money you can for the government!”
A gentleman calling at the White House one evening carried a cane, which, in the course of conversation, attracted the President’s attention. Taking it in his hand, he said: “I always used a cane when I was a boy. It was a freak of mine. My favorite one was a knotted beech stick, and I carved the head myself. There’s a mighty amount of character in sticks. Don’t you think so? You have seen these fishing-poles that fit into a cane? Well that was an old idea of mine. Dogwood clubs were favorite ones with the boys. I suppose they use them yet. Hickory is too heavy, unless you get it from a young sapling. Have you ever noticed how a stick in one’s hand will change his appearance? Old women and witches wouldn’t look so without sticks. Meg Merrilies understands that.”
One of Mr. Lincoln’s “illustrations” in my hearing, on one occasion, was of a man who, in driving the hoops of a hogshead to “head” it up, was much annoyed by the constant falling in of the top. At length the bright idea struck him of putting his little boy inside to “hold it up.” This he did; it never occurring to him till the job was done, how he was to get his child out. “This,” said he, “is a fair sample of the way some people always do business.”