“Some ships come into port that are not steered,” went on the dreamy voice. “Suppose Pickett had charged one hour earlier at Gettysburg? Suppose the Monitor had arrived one hour later at Hampton Roads? I had a dream last night that always presages great events. I saw a white ship passing swiftly under full sail. I have often seen her before. I have never known her port of entry, or her destination, but I have always known her Pilot!”
The cynic’s lips curled with scorn. He leaned heavily on his cane, and took a shambling step toward the door.
“You refuse to heed the wishes of Congress?”
“If your words voice them, yes. Force your scheme of revenge on the South, and you sow the wind to reap the whirlwind.”
“Indeed! and from what secret cave will this whirlwind come?”
“The despair of a mighty race of world-conquering men, even in defeat, is still a force that statesmen reckon with.”
“I defy them,” growled the old Commoner.
Again the dreamy look returned to Lincoln’s face, and he spoke as if repeating a message of the soul caught in the clouds in an hour of transfiguration:
“And I’ll trust the honour of Lee and his people. The mystic chords of memory, stretching from every battlefield and patriot grave to every living heart and hearthstone all over this broad land, will yet swell the chorus of the Union, when touched again, as they surely will be, by the better angels of our nature.”
“You’ll be lucky to live to hear that chorus.”