"No, that was not the reason," corrected the questioner; "it was because, when a boy, he had to work for a living."
He rewarded "the purveyor-general" with the rank of major-general.
"HOLD ON AND CHAW!"
While in July, 1863, General Grant was held at Vicksburg by the siege which he successfully prosecuted, the New York draft riots broke out. Without knowing from experience that a riot, however portentous, must cease when the mob are drunk or spent, the inevitable contingencies, in his alarm General Halleck, at Washington, begged General Grant to send reenforcements, that he might not weaken the capital defenses to any extent. The commander of the West declined and referred to the President. General Horace Porter was on Grant's staff and saw his smiles as he read the despatch from headquarters.
"The President has more nerve than any of his advisers," observed he to his officers, for Lincoln did not agree with his Cabinet, as to the revolution in the rear; and the message was sent by the staff:
"I have seen your despatch, expressing your unwillingness to break your hold. Neither am I willing. Hold on with a bulldog grip, and chaw and choke as much as possible!"
THE GREAT NATIONAL JOB.
"The signs look better. The Father of Waters again goes unvexed to the sea.... The job was a great national one, and let none be banned who bore an honorable part in it. And while those who cleared the great river may well be proud, even that is not all. It is hard to say that anything has been more bravely and well done than at Antietam, Murfreesboro, Gettysburg, and on many fields of lesser note. Nor must Uncle Sam's webfeet be forgotten. Not only on the deep sea, the broad bay, and the rapid river, but also up the narrow, muddy bay, and wherever the ground was a little damp, they have been, and made their tracks! Thanks to all--for the great republic!"--(Letter by President Lincoln, regretting inability to attend a meeting of unconditional Union men at Springfield, Illinois; dated August 26, 1863, to J. C. Conkling.)
FOR FLAYING A MAN ALIVE.
A representative of Ohio, Alexander Long, proposed in the House a recognition of the Southern Confederacy. It must be borne in mind that, before the firing on the supply-steamer at Charleston, which was despatched surreptitiously not "to offend the sympathizers' susceptibilities," many good citizens, dwelling on the silence of the Constitution as to secession, said openly that they did not see why the States chafing under the partnership all the original thirteen made, should not withdraw peacefully. Long was not solitary in his unseemly proposition, which, however, could never have been otherwise than untimely after the first shot.