"JUST WHAT'S THE MATTER WITH THE WHOLE WORLD!"
A Springfield neighbor used to say that it was almost a habit with Mr. Lincoln to carry his children about on his shoulders. Indeed, the man said he seldom saw the tall lawyer go by without one or both boys perched on high or tugging at the tails of his long coat. This neighbor relates that he was attracted to the door of his own house one day by a great noise of crying children, and saw Mr. Lincoln passing with the two boys in their usual position, and both were howling lustily.
"Why, Mr. Lincoln, what's the matter?" he asked in astonishment.
"Just what's the matter with the whole world," the lawyer replied coolly. "I've got three walnuts, and each wants two."
THE "BUCKING" CHESS BOARD
Several years later Judge Treat, of Springfield was playing chess with Mr. Lincoln in his law office when Tad came in to call his father to supper. The boy, impatient at the delay of the slow and silent game, tried to break it up by a flank movement against the chess board, but the attacks were warded off, each time, by his father's long arms.
The child disappeared, and when the two players had begun to believe they were to be permitted to end the game in peace, the table suddenly "bucked" and the board and chessmen were sent flying all over the floor.
Judge Treat was much vexed, and expressed impatience, not hesitating to tell Mr. Lincoln that the boy ought to be punished severely.
Mr. Lincoln replied, as he gently took down his hat to go home to supper:
"Considering the position of your pieces, judge, at the time of the upheaval, I think you have no reason to complain."