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diff --git a/38423-8.txt b/38423-8.txt new file mode 100644 index 0000000..562cc21 --- /dev/null +++ b/38423-8.txt @@ -0,0 +1,2971 @@ +The Project Gutenberg eBook, Why Lincoln Laughed, by Russell Herman Conwell + + +This eBook is for the use of anyone anywhere at no cost and with +almost no restrictions whatsoever. You may copy it, give it away or +re-use it under the terms of the Project Gutenberg License included +with this eBook or online at www.gutenberg.org + + + + + +Title: Why Lincoln Laughed + + +Author: Russell Herman Conwell + + + +Release Date: December 28, 2011 [eBook #38423] + +Language: English + +Character set encoding: ISO-8859-1 + + +***START OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK WHY LINCOLN LAUGHED*** + + +E-text prepared by David Edwards and the Online Distributed Proofreading +Team (http://www.pgdp.net) from page images generously made available by +Internet Archive (http://www.archive.org) + + + +Note: Project Gutenberg also has an HTML version of this + file which includes the original illustration. + See 38423-h.htm or 38423-h.zip: + (http://www.gutenberg.org/files/38423/38423-h/38423-h.htm) + or + (http://www.gutenberg.org/files/38423/38423-h.zip) + + + Images of the original pages are available through + Internet Archive. See + http://www.archive.org/details/whylincolnlaughe00conw + + + + + +WHY LINCOLN LAUGHED + + * * * * * + + BOOKS BY RUSSELL H. CONWELL + + WHY LINCOLN LAUGHED + + EFFECTIVE PRAYER + + ACRES OF DIAMONDS + + HOW A SOLDIER MAY SUCCEED AFTER THE WAR OR + THE CORPORAL WITH THE BOOK + + OBSERVATION: EVERY MAN HIS OWN UNIVERSITY + + WHAT YOU CAN DO WITH YOUR WILL POWER + + + HARPER & BROTHERS, NEW YORK + ESTABLISHED 1817 + + * * * * * + +[Illustration: ABRAHAM LINCOLN] + + +WHY LINCOLN LAUGHED + +by + +RUSSELL H. CONWELL + +Author of "Acres of Diamonds" + + + + + + + +Harper & Brothers Publishers +New York and London +MCMXXII + +WHY LINCOLN LAUGHED + +Copyright, 1922, by Harper & Brothers +Printed in the United States of America +A-W + + + + +CONTENTS + + + CHAP. PAGE + + FOREWORD vii + + I. WHEN LINCOLN WAS LAUGHED AT 1 + + II. PRESIDENT AND PILGRIM 24 + + III. LINCOLN READS ARTEMUS WARD ALOUD 38 + + IV. SOME LINCOLN ANECDOTES 51 + + V. WHAT MADE HIM LAUGH 64 + + VI. HUMOR IN THE POLITICAL SITUATION 82 + + VII. WHY LINCOLN LOVED LAUGHTER 115 + + VIII. LINCOLN AND JOHN BROWN 127 + + + + +FOREWORD + + +Abraham Lincoln wrote to his law partner, William Henry Herndon, that "the +physical side of Niagara Falls is really a very small part of that world's +wonder. Its power to excite reflection and emotion is its great charm." +That statement might fittingly be applied to Lincoln himself. One who +lived in his time, and who has read the thousand books they say have been +written about him in the half century since his death, may still be +dissatisfied with every description of his personality and with every +analysis of his character. He was human, and yet in some mysterious degree +superhuman. Nothing in philosophy, magic, superstition, or religion +furnishes a satisfactory explanation to the thoughtful devotee for the +inspiration he gave out or for the transfiguring glow which at times +seemed to illumine his homely frame and awkward gestures. + +The libraries are stocked with books about Lincoln, written by historians, +poets, statesmen, relatives, and political associates. Why cumber the +shelf with another sketch? + +The answer to that reasonable question is in the expressed hope that great +thinkers and sincere humanitarians may not give up the task of attempting +to set before the people the true Lincoln. One turns away from every +volume, saying, "I am not yet acquainted with that great man." Hence, +books like this simple tale may help to keep the attention of readers and +writers upon this powerful character until at last some clear and +satisfactory portrayal may be had by the interested readers among all +nations. + +Neither bronze nor canvas nor marble can give the true image. Perhaps the +more exact the portrait or statue in respect to his physical appearance +the less it will exhibit the real personality. All pictures of Abraham +Lincoln fail to represent the man as he was. The appearance and the +reality are at irreconcilable variance. + +Heredity may be a large factor in the making of some great men, and +education may be the chief cause for the influence of other great men. But +there are only a few great characters in whose lives both of those +advantages are lost to sight in the view of their achievements. + +Genius is often defined with complacent assurance as the ability and +disposition to do hard work. That is frequently the truth; but it is not +always the truth. Abraham Lincoln did much of many kinds of hard work, but +that does not account for his extraordinary genius. He had the least to +boast of in his family inheritance. His school education was of the most +meager kind, and he had more than his share of hard luck. His most +difficult task was to overcome his awkward manners and ungainly physique. +His life, therefore, presents a problem worthy the attention of +philanthropic scientists. + +Can he be successfully imitated? Why did his laugh vibrate so far, and why +was his humor so inimitable? If the suggestions made in this book will aid +the investigator in finding an answer to these questions it will justify +the venturesomeness of this volume in appearing upon the shelf with such a +great company of the works of greater authors. + +RUSSELL H. CONWELL. + +PHILADELPHIA, _January, 1922_. + + + + +WHY LINCOLN LAUGHED + + + + +Chapter I: When Lincoln Was Laughed At + + +Lincoln loved laughter; he loved to laugh himself and he liked to hear +others laugh. All who knew him, all who have written of him, from John +Hay, years ago, to Harvey O'Higgins in his recent work, tell how, in the +darkest moments our country has ever known, Lincoln would find time to +illustrate his arguments and make his points by narrating some amusing +story. His humor never failed him, and through its help he was able to +bear his great burden. + +I first met Lincoln at the White House during the Civil War. To-day it +seems almost impossible that I shook his hand, heard his voice, and +watched him as he laughed at one of his own stories and at the writings of +Artemus Ward, of which he was so fond. Yet, as I remember it, I did not +feel at that time that I was in the presence of a personality so +extraordinary that it would fascinate men for centuries to come. I was a +young man, and it was war time; perhaps that is the reason. On the +contrary, he seemed a very simple man, as all great men are--I might +almost say ordinary, throwing his long leg over the arm of the chair and +using such commonplace, homely language. Indeed, it was hard to be awed in +the presence of Lincoln; he seemed so approachable, so human, simple, and +genial. + +Did he use his humor to disarm opposition, to gain good will, or to throw +a mantle around his own melancholy thoughts? Did he believe, as Mark Twain +said, that "Everything human is pathetic; the secret source of humor is +not joy, but sorrow?" I am sure I cannot say. I only know that humor to +Lincoln seemed to be a safety valve without which he would have collapsed +under the crushing burden which he carried during the Civil War. + +Until he was twenty-four and was admitted to the bar, he was a quiet, +serious, brooding young fellow, but apparently he discovered the +effectiveness of humor, for he began using it when he was arguing before +the court. Some of his contemporaries say that he was humorous in the +early part of his life, but that, as time went on and he gained confidence +through success, he used humor less and less in his public utterances. +This is partly true, for there is no trace of humor in his presidential +addresses. But that he was humorous in his daily life and that he +continued to read and laugh over the many jokes he read is too obvious to +deny. You cannot think of Lincoln without thinking at the same time of +that very American trait which he possessed and which seems to spring from +and within the soil of the land--homely humor. + +One day when I was at the White House in conversation with Lincoln a man +bustled in self-importantly and whispered something to him. As the man +left the room Lincoln turned to me and smiled. + +"He tells me that twelve thousand of Lee's soldiers have just been +captured," Lincoln said. "But that doesn't mean anything; he's the biggest +liar in Washington. You can't believe a word he says. He reminds me of an +old fisherman I used to know who got such a reputation for stretching the +truth that he bought a pair of scales and insisted on weighing every fish +in the presence of witnesses. + +"One day a baby was born next door, and the doctor borrowed the +fisherman's scales to weigh the baby. It weighed forty-seven pounds." + +Lincoln threw back his head and laughed; so did I. It was a good story. +Now what do you think of this? Only recently I picked up a newspaper and +read that same Lincoln anecdote, and it was headed, "A New Story." + +It was in connection with a death sentence that I first went to call upon +President Lincoln. This was in December, 1864. I was a captain then in a +Massachusetts regiment brigaded with other regiments for the work of the +North Carolina coast defense, under command of Gen. Benjamin F. Butler. A +young soldier and boyhood playmate of mine from Vermont had been sentenced +by court martial to be shot for sending communications to the enemy. What +had actually happened was this. The fighting at that time in our part of +the country was desultory--a matter of skirmishes only. As must inevitably +happen, even between hostile bodies of men speaking the same language, a +certain amount of "fraternizing" (although that word was not used then) +went on between the outposts and pickets of the opposing forces. In some +cases the pickets faced one another on opposite sides of a narrow stream. +Often this would continue for days or weeks, the same men on the same +posts, and something very like friendship--the friendship of respectful +enemies--would spring up between individuals in the two camps. They would +sometimes go so far as to exchange little delicacies, tobacco and the +like, across the line, No Man's Land, as it was called in the last war. In +some places the practice actually sprang up of whittling little toy boats +and sailing them across a stream, carrying a tiny freight. This act was +usually reciprocated to the best of his pitiful ability by Johnny Reb on +the opposite bank. + +The custom served to while away the tedious hours of picket duty, and it +is doubtful if any of these young fellows thought of their acts as +constituting a serious military offense. But such in fact it was; and +when my young friend was caught red-handed in the act of sending a +Northern newspaper into the Rebel lines he was straightway brought to +trial on the terrible charge of corresponding with the enemy. He was found +guilty and sentenced to be shot. + +When the time for the execution of this sentence had nearly arrived I +determined, as a last resort, to go and lay the case before the President +in person, for it was evident, from the way matters had gone, that no +mercy could be hoped for from any lesser tribunal. Fortunately, I was able +to secure a few days' leave of absence. I made the trip up to Hampton +Roads by way of the old Dismal Swamp Canal. Hampton Roads was by this time +under undisputed control of the Union forces, naval and military, and +Fortress Monroe was, in fact, General Butler's headquarters. + +From this point it was a simple, if somewhat tedious, matter to get to +Washington. But for one young officer the trip went all too quickly. The +nearer loomed the nation's capital and the culmination of his momentous +errand the more he became amazed at his own temerity, and it required the +constant thought of a gray-haired mother, soon to be broken hearted by +sorrow and disgrace, to hold him steadfast to his purpose. + +I had seen Lincoln only once in my life, and that was merely as one of the +audience in Cooper Union, in New York, when he delivered his great speech +on abolition. That had taken place on February 17, 1860, nearly five years +before--long enough to make many changes in men and nations--yet the +thought of that tall, awkward orator with his total lack of sophistication +and his great wealth of human sympathy did much to hearten me for the +coming interview. Unconsciously, as the miles jolted past in my journey to +Washington, my mind slipped back over those five tremendous years and I +seemed to live again the events, half pitiful, but wholly amazing, of +that great meeting in the great auditorium of old Cooper Union. + +At that time I was a school-teacher from the Hampshire highlands of the +Berkshire Hills, and a neighbor of William Cullen Bryant. Through his +kindness, my brother, who was also a teacher, and myself received an +invitation to hear this speech by a then little-known lawyer from the +West. We were told at the hotel that the Cooper Union lectures were +usually discussions on matters of practical education, and we therefore +used our tickets of admission more out of deference to Mr. Bryant for his +kindness than from any interest in the debate. + +When we approached the entrance to the building, however, we were soon +aware that something unusual was about to happen. On the corner of the +street near by we were accosted by a crowd of young roughs who demanded of +us whether or not we were "nigger men." We thought that the roughs meant +to ask if we were black men, and answered decidedly, "No!" What the mob +meant to ask was, were we in favor of freeing the negroes. Acting, +therefore, upon the innocent answer, they thrust into our hands two dry +onions, with the withered tops still adhering to the bulbs, while the +ragged crowd yelled, "Keep 'em under yer jacket and when yer hear the five +whistles throw them at the feller speakin'." + +My brother and I took the onions, unconscious of the meaning of such +strange missiles, and entered the hall with the crowd. There was great +excitement, and yet we could not understand why, for no one seemed to know +even the name of the speaker. + +"Who is going to speak?" was the question asked all round us, which we +asked also, although we had heard the unfamiliar name of Lincoln. + +In one part of the hall we heard several vociferous answers: "Beecher! +Beecher!" and some of the crowd seemed satisfied that the great preacher +was to be the orator of the evening. Two burly policemen pushed into the +corner from which the noisiest tumult came, and we began to surmise that +those onions were "concealed weapons" and that the best policy was to be +sure to keep them concealed. Many descriptions of that audience have been +given by men from various viewpoints, but few have emphasized the +important fact that when the people entered the hall the large majority +were bitterly opposed to the abolitionists' cause. One-third of the +audience was seemingly intent on mobbing the speaker, for some of the men +carried missiles more offensive than onions. + +Mark Twain sagaciously wrote that the trouble with old men's memories is +that they remember so many things "that ain't so." That warning may often +be useful, even to those who are the most confident that their memories +are infallible, but I should like to say, and quite modestly, that I still +have a clear vision of that startling occasion and can testify to what I +saw, heard, and felt in that hall on that memorable evening. + +I had previously read and studied the great models of eloquence, and was +then in New York, using my carefully hoarded pennies to hear Henry Ward +Beecher, Dr. R. S. Stone, Doctor Storrs, Doctor Bellows, Archbishop +McCloskey, and other orators of current fame. I had studied much for the +purpose of teaching my classes, from the great models, from Cicero to +Daniel Webster, and I had found my ideal in Edward Everett. But those two +hours in Cooper Union; like a sudden cyclone, were destined to shatter all +my carefully built theories. After nearly sixty-two years of bewilderment +I am still asking, "What was it that made that speech on that night an +event of such world-wide importance?" It was not the physical man; it was +not in what he said. Let us with open judgment meditate on the facts. + +The persons in the audience, and their city, as well, were antagonistic to +Lincoln's party associates. The negro-haters had seemingly pre-empted the +hall. Stories of negro brutality had been published in the papers of that +week. Lincoln was regarded as an adventurer from the "wild and woolly +West." He was expected to be an extremist. He was crude, unpolished, +having no reputation in the East as a scholar. He was not an orator and +had the reputation of being only a homely teller of grocery-store yarns. +His voice was of a poor quality, grinding the ears sharply. He seemed to +be a ludicrous scarecrow rival of the great gentleman, scholar, and +statesman, William H. Seward. Even Lincoln's own party in New York City +bowed religiously to Seward, the idol of New York State. The Quakers and +the adherents of the pro-slavery party were conscientiously opposed to +war, especially against a civil war. + +We now know that Lincoln's speech had been written in Illinois. As I saw +him, on its delivery, he himself was trebly chained to his manuscript, by +his own modest timidity, by the dictation of his party managers, and by +the fact that when he spoke his written speech was already set up in type +for the next morning's papers. + +In the chair on the platform as presiding officer sat the venerable poet +of the New England mountains and the writer of keen political editorials. +The minds of the intelligent auditors began to repeat "Thanatopsis" or +"The Fringed Gentian" as soon as they saw the noble old man. His culture, +age, reputation, dignified bearing, and faultless attire seemed in +disparaging contrast to the appearance of the young visitor beside him. In +addition to Mr. Bryant, the stage setting included, on the other side of +the slender guest, a very ponderous fat man, whose proportions, in their +contrasting effect upon the speaker of the evening, made his thin form so +tall as to bring to mind Lincoln's story of the man "so tall they laid +him out in a rope walk." + +Lincoln himself was seated in a half-round armchair. His awkward legs were +tied in a kind of a knot in the rungs of the chair. His tall hat, with his +manuscript in it, was near him on the floor. The black fur of the hat was +rubbed into rough streaks. One of his trousers legs was caught on the back +of his boot. His coat was too large. His head was bowed and he looked down +at the floor without lifting his eyes. + +Somebody whispered in one of the back seats, "Let's go home," and was +answered, "No, not yet; there'll be fun here soon!" + +The entrance of the stranger speaker was greeted with neither decided nor +hearty applause. In fact, the greeting for Mr. Bryant was far more +enthusiastic. But there was a chilling formality in the effect of the +whole of Mr. Bryant's introduction. Nothing worth hearing was expected of +the lank and uncouth stranger--that was the impression made upon me. And +when young Lincoln made an awkward gesture in trying to bow his thanks to +Mr. Bryant, the audience began to smirk and giggle. Lincoln was evidently +disturbed and felt painfully out of place. He seemed to be fearfully +lacking in self-control and appeared to feel that he had made a ridiculous +mistake in accepting such an invitation to such a place. One singular +proof of Lincoln's nervousness was in the fact that he had forgotten to +take from the top of his ear a long, black lead pencil, which occasionally +threatened to shoot out at the audience. + +When I mentioned the pencil to Lincoln nearly five years later, he said +that his absent-mindedness on that occasion recalled to him the story of +an old Englishman who was so absent-minded that when he went to bed he put +his clothes carefully into the bed and threw himself over the back of his +chair. + +When Mr. Bryant's introduction was concluded, Lincoln hesitated. He +attempted to rise, and caught the toe of his boot under the rung of his +chair. He ran his long fingers through his hair, which left one long tuft +sticking up from the back of his head like an Indian's feather. He looked +pale, and he unrolled his manuscript with trembling fingers. He began to +read in a low, hollow voice that trembled from uncertainty and +nervousness--so low, in fact, that the crowd at the rear of the hall could +not hear, and shouted: "Louder! Louder!" + +At this the speaker's voice became a little stronger, and with this added +strength came added confidence, so much so that there came suddenly a +slight climax. The speaker looked up from his manuscript as though to note +the effect of his words. But his eyes quickly dropped again to the paper +in his shaking hands. The applause was fitful, and from the corner where +the hoodlums were assembled came several distinct hisses. + +When the audience finally began to make out what he was endeavoring to say +about the signers of the Declaration of Independence and their opposition +to the extension of human slavery, there was for a time respectful +silence. + +How long the painful recital might have been permitted to continue no one +can tell. The crowd, even that portion inclined to favor Lincoln's views, +was growing increasingly restless. Half an hour had passed. The ordeal +could not go on much longer. Suddenly a leaf from the speaker's manuscript +accidentally and without his knowledge dropped to the floor. The moment he +missed the leaf he turned a little paler than he had been and hesitated +awkwardly. + +For a moment the audience felt keenly the embarrassment of the situation. +But the pause was brief. With an honest gesture of impatience and a +movement forward as if he were about to leap into the audience, Lincoln +lifted his voice, swung out his long arms, and, as my brother remarked, +"let himself go." + +Disregarding his written speech,[1] Lincoln launched into that part of the +subject that was nearest his heart. In a voice that no longer was hollow +or sepulchral, but rich and ringing, he denounced the institution of +slavery. Yet he spoke of the South in the most affectionate terms. He said +he loved the South, since "he was born there," but that he loved the Union +more for what it had done united and what it was destined still to do +united. + + [1] Charles Sumner said, in one of his great speeches in Fanueil Hall, + Boston, that if the speech Lincoln carefully wrote had not been + circulated, or if he had actually delivered the speech which he wrote, + the change of direction in the car of progress would have led to + delays and disasters "out beyond the limits of human calculation." + Many of the great historians like Hay, Brockett, McClure, and Miss + Tarbell have overlooked or thrown aside the most wonderful portion of + that speech where the disgusted orator lost his place because of a + misplaced leaf of the manuscript from which he was reading. + +Wave after wave of telling eloquence rolled forth from this uncouth, gaunt +figure and literally dashed itself against the hard, resisting minds of +that prejudiced audience. Already the feeble wits were engulfed in the +overwhelming verbal torrents that came now like avalanches, and little by +little even the most biased minds began to relent under the mystic +persuasiveness of his voice and the unanswerableness of his logic, until +nearly everybody in that throbbing and excited audience was convinced that +slavery was one of the blackest crimes of which man could be found guilty. +And even before the last words of his impassioned eloquence had passed his +lips the audience was on its feet, and those most bitterly opposed to him +politically arose too and applauded him. + +Naturally, no verbatim report of that address can be recalled after sixty +years. But the impression it made almost surpasses belief when told to +those who were not there. There is no clearer descriptive term which could +be applied to the speaker than to state, as some did, that "the orator +was transfigured." No one thought of his ill-fitting new suit, of his old +hat, of his protruding wrists or the disheveled hair, of his long legs, +his bony face, or the one-sided necktie. The natural Abraham Lincoln had +disappeared and an angel spake in his place. Nothing but language which +seems extravagant will tell the accurate truth. + +All manner of theories were advanced by those who heard the speech to +account for the gigantic mystery of eloquent power which he exhibited. One +said it was mesmerism; another that it was magnetism; while the +superstitious said there was "a distinct halo about his head" at one place +in the speech. No analysis of the speech as he wrote it, nor any +recollection of the words, shows anything remarkable in language, figures, +or ideas. The subtle, magnetic, spiritual force which emanated from that +inspired speaker revealed to his audience an altogether different man from +the one who began to read a different speech. He did not approach the +delicate sweetness of Mr. Bryant's words of introduction, or reach the +imaginative scenes and noble company which characterized Beecher's +addresses. Lincoln was less cutting than Wendell Phillips and had no +definite style like Everett or Gough. As an orator he imitated no one, and +surely no one could imitate him. Of the four Ohio voters who changed their +votes in the Republican convention and made Lincoln's nomination sure, two +heard that Cooper Union speech and claimed sturdily that they knew "old +Abe" was right, but could not tell why. + +Thus it appears throughout Lincoln's public life. He was larger than his +task, wider than his party, ahead of his time as an inspired prophet, and +he seemed to be a spiritual force without material limitations. He began +to grow at his death, and is conquering now in lands he never saw and +rules over nations which cannot pronounce his name. Such individual +influence is next to the divine, and is of the same nature. Can we find a +measure for such a man? + +These facts and these thoughts were in my mind as I traveled to Washington +to intercede for my condemned comrade. Such was the man to whom I was +going. But it was to Lincoln the commander-in-chief, and not to Lincoln +the impassioned orator, that I must make my plea. + + + + +Chapter II: President and Pilgrim + + +The reader will not be surprised to learn that getting into the presence +of the President was no laughing matter, and that his own habit of +occasionally using laughter during business hours did not always descend +to those under him in the government. + +I arrived in Washington early on a crisp December morning, just a few days +before Christmas. I went straightway to the old Ebbit House, which was +then the fashionable gathering place for military people stationed or +sojourning in the capital. The contrast between "desk officers" and +officers in the field was even greater then than in more recent days, +because if the former were less smart in appearance than the modern +"citified" officer, the latter were, as a rule, vastly more disheveled +and disreputable in appearance than one would find in any army of to-day +on campaign. There were good reasons for this, of course, but they did not +greatly help to increase the confidence of a decidedly "seedy"-looking +young officer fresh from the swamps and thickets of North Carolina. I was +glad to get away from the environs of the Ebbit House after a brief but +very earnest effort to "spruce up." + +When the time at last arrived that the ordeal was directly ahead, I +plucked up courage and walked up the footpath to the White House with a +tolerably certain step. Even at the height of the war President Lincoln +did not surround himself by the barriers which later Executives have found +necessary. One simply went to the White House, stated his business, and +waited his turn for an interview. + +Once inside that building, however, my earlier timidity returned tenfold. +I had agreed that morning with the local correspondent of the New York +_Tribune_ to get all the material I could from Lincoln for an interview +for his paper. I trembled as with a chill when I told the doorkeeper that +I wished to see the President, and when the official coldly ordered me to +"come in and sit over there, in that row," I began to doubt whether I was +to be arrested for intrusion. The anteroom was crowded with +important-looking people, all waiting for an interview with Lincoln. I +wondered if I would ever get within sight of his door. + +Presently, however, the President's personal secretary entered the room, +and passing along the line of visitors with a notebook, asked each to +state his business with the President. I showed my pass and in a few words +explained my errand, even mustering up courage to emphasize the urgency of +the case. + +The secretary disappeared, and there was an awkward half hour of waiting. +Finally he returned by a side door and, calling out my name, directed me +in an official way to "come in at once" ahead of all the others. When I +had passed into the vestibule the secretary shut the reception-room door +behind us and, pointing to a door at the other side of the room, said, +hastily: "That is the President's door. Go over, rap on the door, and walk +right in." He then hurried out at a side door and left me alone. + +Thus abandoned, I felt faint with terror, embarrassment, and conflicting +decisions. It was a most painful ordeal to be left to go in alone to meet +the august head of the nation--to rush alone into the privacy of the +commander-in-chief of all the loyal armies of the Union. It was an +especially trying period of the war which we had just passed through. +Sherman's march to the sea was still in progress. The President had not +yet received the historic telegram in which General Sherman offered him +the city of Savannah as a Christmas gift, but he was well aware of the +thorough devastation which that army left in its wake; and while he +understood its necessity, the thought filled him with deepest gloom. +Hood's Confederate army, which threatened for a time to repeat the +successes of General Kirby Smith, had been crushed in Tennessee, but only +after a period of suspense which stretched the nerves of all in +administration circles to within a degree of the breaking point. In +addition to this the voices of the "defeatists"--"Copperheads," they were +called then--were heard far and wide in the land, ranting and howling +their demand for a peace which would have been premature and inconclusive. +The cares and sorrows of the President had hardly been more severe during +the most critical days of the war than they were in December, 1864--it was +the dark just before the dawn. + +Whether to turn and run for the street, to stand still, or to force myself +to rap on that awful door was a question filling my soul with frightful +emotions. I rubbed my head and walked several times across the vestibule +to regain possession of my normal faculties. No one who has not been +placed in such a startling situation can begin to realize what a +stage-struck heartache afflicted me. I had been under fire and heard the +shells crack and the bullets sing, but none of those experiences, so awful +to a green soldier, had so filled my being with a desire to run away. But +I recalled the fact that the President had the reputation of being a plain +man to whom any citizen could speak on the street and was kind-hearted to +an almost feminine degree, so I wiped my brow and at last drove myself +over to the door. There, with the desperation such as the suicide must +feel as he leaps from the cliff, I rapped hesitatingly on the door. + +Instantly a strong voice from inside shouted, "Come in and sit down." It +was a command rather than an invitation. + +I turned the knob weakly and entered, almost on tiptoe. There at the side +of a long table sat the same lank individual who spoke at the Cooper +Union four years before. The pallor of his face and the prominence of the +cheek bones seemed even more striking in contrast with the full beard than +when he was clean shaven. But his hair was as sadly disturbed and his +clothing had the same lack of style and fitness. An old gray shawl had +fallen across one corner of the table, where also lay numerous rolls of +papers. The President did not look up when I stepped in and hesitatingly +sat down in the chair nearest the door. + +That close application to the task before him was a characteristic of +Lincoln which has not been emphasized by his biographers as it could and +should have been. To quote his own words, whenever he read a book he +"exhausted it." It seems to be the one great trait of character which +lifted him above the common clay from which he came. Lincoln had no +inheritance worth recording. He once wrote to his partner that what little +talent, money, and learning he had was "purloined or picked up." + +Surely, never among the surprises which one finds in the history of this +nation is there one more unaccountable than the career of Abraham Lincoln. +How he first formed the habit, or where he adopted his method of mental +concentration, has not been revealed. The ability to focus one's whole +mind on a single idea is not such an unattainable achievement. Perhaps it +has no connection with genius in the true sense, but it serves to +concentrate all the rays of mental light and power until they penetrate +the hardest substances and ignite into explosion the latent power hitherto +unguessed. + +There seems to be no other great quality in Lincoln's mentality, but that +one may account for all in him that was above the normal. He could manage +flatboats, split rails, endure fatigue, tell homely stories for +illustration, and wait with unshakable patience, but his greatest +achievement was in the power he gained to think hard and long with his +mind immovably concentrated upon a difficult problem. + +That morning while I sat trembling by the door, the President read on with +undisturbed attention the manuscript before him, occasionally making notes +on the margin of the paper. He did not lift his eyes or move in his seat, +and it was not until he had read carefully the last sentence, had +scribbled his name or initials at the bottom of the last page, and had +tied the paper carefully with a string, that he looked up at his visitor. +Then a smile came over the worn face, and as he pulled himself into his +spring-backed chair he called out, cheerfully: + +"Come over to the table, young man. Glad to see you. But remember that I +am a very busy man and have no time to spare; so tell me in the fewest +words what it is you want." + +I took the seat at the table to which the President pointed, pulled out a +copy of the record of the case, and read the soldier's name. The +President stopped me almost sharply, saying: + +"Oh, you don't need to read more about that case. Mr. Stanton and I talked +over that report carefully last week!" + +Already my nervousness had been dispelled as if by magic. Indeed, the +President's cordial, familiar manner and apparent good will gave me the +courage to remark that it was "almost time for that order to be carried +out." For a moment Lincoln seemed to be offended by the hasty remark. +Flinging himself back in his chair with an impatient gesture, he said: + +"You can go down to the Ebbit House _now_ and write to that soldier's +mother in Vermont and tell her the President told you that he never did +sign an order to shoot a boy under twenty years of age and _that he never +will_!" + +As he uttered the last words of that remark he swung his long arms swiftly +over his head and struck the table violently with his fist. At that +moment Lincoln's boy, "Tad," then eleven years old, slipped off a stool in +the farther corner of the room, where he had been silently at play, and +Lincoln turned anxiously around at the sound of his fall. Seeing that the +little boy was unhurt, the President called: + +"Come here, Tad, I wish to introduce you to this soldier!" + +So quickly and easily had the purpose of my interview been accomplished +that for a moment it left me dazed. But Lincoln wanted no thanks. What was +done was done, and the incident was closed. The name of my young soldier +friend was not mentioned again in the course of what turned out to be a +long and wonderful chat about subjects as alien to discipline as music, +education, and the cultivation and use of humor. The President had a +purpose in detaining me, though at first I did not perceive what this was. + +Without appearing in the least to see anything incongruous in the +act--while a score of important callers waited in the anteroom--Lincoln +threw his long arm about the little boy and plunged into a conversation of +the most personal sort. He told me it was his ambition to carry on a farm, +with Tad for a partner. He said that he had bought a farm at New Salem, +Illinois, where he used to dig potatoes at twenty-five cents a day, and +that Tad and he were to have mule teams and raise corn and onions. Then he +smiled as he remarked, "Mrs. Lincoln does not know anything about the plan +for the onions." + +He said farming was, after all, the best occupation on earth. He then told +a number of incidents in his own life to illustrate, as he said, "How +little I know about farming!" The incidents were droll and full of wise +suggestions, which wholly disarmed me until I laughed without reserve. + +Lincoln told of a visit Horace Greeley had made to the White House a few +weeks before to enlighten the President on "What I know about farming." +Lincoln said he half believed the story about Greeley wherein it was said +that he (Greeley) planted a long row of beans, and when in the process of +first growth the beans were pushed bodily out of the ground, Greeley +concluded that the beans "had made a blunder," and, pulling up each bean, +he carefully turned it over with the roots sticking out in the air. + +The President then asked me if I was a farmer's boy, and when I answered +that I was brought up on a farm in the Berkshire Hills he burst out into +strong laughter and said, "I hear that you have to sharpen the noses of +the sheep up there to get them down to the grass between the rocks." Then +the President, as his mind was led away from the awful cares of state, +turned to a small side table and picked up a much-worn copy of the News +Stand Edition of the _Life and Sayings of Artemus Ward_. Both Ward and +Lincoln were skilled storytellers, and they were alike in their avoidance +of vulgar or low yarns. Lincoln was credited with thousands of yarns he +never heard, and with thousands to which he would not have listened +without giving a rebuke. Many of those at which he revolted have been +continued in print under his name. But Ward's speech concerning his visit +to the President among the office-seeking crowd was to Lincoln's mind "a +masterpiece of pure fun." + +As we sat there Lincoln opened Artemus Ward's book and read several things +from it. Then closing it, he said, "Ward rests me more than any living +man." + + + + +Chapter III: Lincoln Reads Artemus Ward Aloud + + +This generation, whose taste in humor has naturally changed from that of +Civil War times, is not very familiar with the stories of Artemus Ward. It +will be well for the reader to bear this in mind in the pages that follow. + +One of the two stories Lincoln read by way of relaxation, as I have told +in the preceding chapter, concerned the President himself. Here it is: + + +HOW OLD ABE RECEIVED THE NEWS OF HIS NOMINATION + +There are several reports afloat as to how "Honest Old Abe" received the +news of his nomination, none of which are correct. We give the correct +report. + +The Official Committee arrived in Springfield at dewy eve, and went to +Honest Old Abe's house. Honest Old Abe was not in. Mrs. Honest Old Abe +said Honest Old Abe was out in the woods splitting rails. So the Official +Committee went out into the woods, where, sure enough, they found Honest +Old Abe splitting rails with his two boys. It was a grand, a magnificent +spectacle. There stood Honest Old Abe in his shirt-sleeves, a pair of +leather home-made suspenders holding up a pair of home-made pantaloons, +the seat of which was neatly patched with substantial cloth of a different +color. "Mr. Lincoln, Sir, you've been nominated, Sir, for the highest +office, Sir--" "Oh, don't bother me," said Honest Old Abe; "I took a +_stent_ this mornin' to split three million rails afore night, and I don't +want to be pestered with no stuff about no Conventions till I get my stent +done. I've only got two hundred thousand rails to split before sundown. I +kin do it if you'll let me alone." And the great man went right on +splitting rails, paying no attention to the Committee whatever. The +Committee were lost in admiration for a few moments, when they recovered, +and asked one of Honest Old Abe's boys whose boy he was? "I'm my parent's +boy," shouted the urchin, which burst of wit so convulsed the Committee +that they came very near "gin'in eout" completely. In a few moments Honest +Ole Abe finished his task, and received the news with perfect +self-possession. He then asked them up to the house, where he received +them cordially. He said he split three million rails every day, although +he was in very poor health. Mr. Lincoln is a jovial man, and has a keen +sense of the ludicrous. During the evening he asked Mr. Evarts, of New +York, "why Chicago was like a hen crossing the street?" Mr. Evarts gave it +up. "Because," said Mr. Lincoln, "Old Grimes is dead, that good old man!" +This exceedingly humorous thing created the most uproarious laughter. + + +INTERVIEW WITH PRESIDENT LINCOLN + +I hav no politics. Not a one. I'm not in the bizniss. If I was I spose I +should holler versiffrusly in the streets at nite and go home to Betsy +Jane smellin of coal ile and gin, in the mornin. I should go to the Poles +arly. I should stay there all day. I should see to it that my nabers was +thar. I should git carriges to take the kripples, the infirm, and the +indignant thar. I should be on guard agin frauds and sich. I should be on +the look out for the infamus lise of the enemy, got up jest be4 elecshun +for perlitical effeck. When all was over and my candy-date was elected, I +should move heving & erth--so to speak--until I got orfice, which if I +didn't git a orfice I should turn round and abooze the Administration with +all my mite and maine. But I'm not in the bizniss. I'm in a far more +respectful bizniss nor what pollertics is. I wouldn't giv two cents to be +a Congresser. The wuss insult I ever received was when sertin citizens of +Baldinsville axed me to run fur the Legislater. Sez I, "My frends, dostest +think I'd stoop to that there?" They turned as white as a sheet. I spoke +in my most orfullest tones & they knowed I wasn't to be trifled with. They +slunked out of site to onct. + +There4, havin no politics, I made bold to visit Old Abe at his humstid in +Springfield. I found the old feller in his parler, surrounded by a perfeck +swarm of orfice seekers. Knowin he had been capting of a flat boat on the +roarin Mississippy I thought I'd address him in sailor lingo, so sez I, +"Old Abe, ahoy! Let out yer main-suls, reef hum the forecastle & throw yer +jib-poop over-board! Shiver my timbers, my harty!" [N. B. This is ginuine +mariner langwidge. I know, becawz I've seen sailor plays acted out by them +New York theater fellers.] Old Abe lookt up quite cross & sez, "Send in +yer petition by & by. I can't possibly look at it now. Indeed, I can't. +It's on-possible, sir!" + +"Mr. Linkin, who do you spect I air?" sed I. + +"A orfice-seeker, to be sure," sed he. + +"Wall, sir," sed I, "you's never more mistaken in your life. You hain't +gut a orfiss I'd take under no circumstances. I'm A. Ward. Wax figgers is +my perfeshun. I'm the father of Twins, and they look like me--_both of +them_. I cum to pay a friendly visit to the President eleck of the United +States. If so be you wants to see me, say so, if not, say so & I'm orf +like a jug handle." + +"Mr. Ward, sit down. I am glad to see you, Sir." + +"Repose in Abraham's Buzzum!" sed one of the orfice seekers, his idee bein +to git orf a goak at my expense. + +"Wall," sez I, "ef all you fellers repose in that there Buzzum thar'll be +mity poor nussin for sum of you!" whereupon Old Abe buttoned his weskit +clear up and blusht like a maidin of sweet 16. Jest at this pint of the +conversation another swarm of orfice-seekers arrove & cum pilin into the +parler. Sum wanted post orfices, sum wanted collectorships, sum wantid +furrin missions, and all wanted sumthin. I thought Old Abe would go crazy. +He hadn't more than had time to shake hands with 'em, before another +tremenjis crowd cum porein onto his premises. His house and dooryard was +now perfeckly overflowed with orfice seekers, all clameruss for a immejit +interview with Old Abe. One man from Ohio, who had about seven inches of +corn whisky into him, mistook me for Old Abe and addrest me as "The +Pra-hayrie Flower of the West!" Thinks I _you_ want a offiss putty bad. +Another man with a gold-heded cane and a red nose told Old Abe he was "a +seckind Washington & the Pride of the Boundliss West." + +Sez I, "Square, you wouldn't take a small post-offiss if you could git it, +would you?" + +Sez he, "A patrit is abuv them things, sir!" + +"There's a putty big crop of patrits this season, ain't there, Squire?" +sez I, when _another_ crowd of offiss seekers pored in. The house, +dooryard, barngs, woodshed was now all full, and when _another_ crowd cum +I told 'em not to go away for want of room as the hog-pen was still empty. +One patrit from a small town in Michygan went up on top the house, got +into the chimney and slid into the parler where Old Abe was endeverin to +keep the hungry pack of orfice-seekers from chawin him up alive without +benefit of clergy. The minit he reached the fireplace he jumpt up, brusht +the soot out of his eyes, and yelled: "Don't make eny pintment at the +Spunkville postoffiss till you've read my papers. All the respectful men +in our town is signers to that there dockyment!" + +"Good God!" cried Old Abe, "they cum upon me from the skize--down the +chimneys, and from the bowels of the yerth!" He hadn't more'n got them +words out of his delikit mouth before two fat offiss-seekers from +Winconsin, in endeverin to crawl atween his legs for the purpuss of +applyin for the tollgateship at Milwawky, upsot the President eleck, & he +would hev gone sprawlin into the fireplace if I hadn't caught him in these +arms. But I hadn't more'n stood him up strate before another man cum +crashing down the chimney, his head strikin me viliently again the inards +and prostratin my voluptoous form onto the floor. "Mr. Linkin," shoutid +the infatooated being, "my papers is signed by every clergyman in our +town, and likewise the skoolmaster!" + +Sez I, "You egrejis ass," gittin up & brushin the dust from my eyes, "I'll +sign your papers with this bunch of bones, if you don't be a little more +keerful how you make my bread basket a depot in the futur. How do you like +that air perfumery?" sez I, shuving my fist under his nose. "Them's the +kind of papers I'll giv you! Them's the papers _you_ want!" + +"But I workt hard for the ticket; I toiled night and day! The patrit +should be rewarded!" + +"Virtoo," sed I, holdin' the infatooated man by the coat-collar, "virtoo, +sir, is its own reward. Look at me!" He did look at me, and qualed be4 my +gase. "The fact is," I continued, lookin' round on the hungry crowd, +"there is scacely a offiss for every ile lamp carrid round durin' this +campane. I wish thare was. I wish thare was furrin missions to be filled +on varis lonely Islands where eprydemics rage incessantly, and if I was in +Old Abe's place I'd send every mother's son of you to them. What air you +here for?" I continnered, warmin up considerable, "can't you giv Abe a +minit's peace? Don't you see he's worrid most to death? Go home, you +miserable men, go home & till the sile! Go to peddlin tinware--go to +choppin wood--go to bilin' sope--stuff sassengers--black boots--git a +clerkship on sum respectable manure cart--go round as original Swiss Bell +Ringers--becum 'origenal and only' Campbell Minstrels--go to lecturin at +50 dollars a nite--imbark in the peanut bizniss--_write for the +Ledger_--saw off your legs and go round givin concerts, with tuchin +appeals to a charitable public, printed on your handbills--anything for a +honest living, but don't come round here drivin Old Abe crazy by your +outrajis cuttings up! Go home. Stand not upon the order of your goin', but +go to onct! Ef in five minits from this time," sez I, pullin' out my new +sixteen dollar huntin cased watch and brandishin' it before their eyes, +"Ef in five minits from this time a single sole of you remains on these +here premises, I'll go out to my cage near by, and let my Boy Constructor +loose! & ef he gits amung you, you'll think old Solferino has cum again +and no mistake!" You ought to hev seen them scamper, Mr. Fair. They run of +as tho Satun hisself was arter them with a red hot ten pronged pitchfork. +In five minits the premises was clear. + +"How kin I ever repay you, Mr. Ward, for your kindness?" sed Old Abe, +advancin and shakin me warmly by the hand. "How kin I ever repay you, +sir?" + +"By givin the whole country a good, sound administration. By poerin' ile +upon the troubled waturs, North and South. By pursooin' a patriotic, firm, +and just course, and then if any State wants to secede, let 'em Sesesh!" + +"How 'bout my Cabinit, Mister Ward?" sed Abe. + +"Fill it up with Showmen, sir! Showmen, is devoid of politics. They hain't +got any principles. They know how to cater for the public. They know what +the public wants, North & South. Showmen, sir, is honest men. Ef you doubt +their literary ability, look at their posters, and see small bills! Ef you +want a Cabinit as is a Cabinit fill it up with showmen, but don't call on +me. The moral wax figger perfeshun mustn't be permitted to go down while +there's a drop of blood in these vains! A. Linkin, I wish you well! Ef +Powers or Walcutt wus to pick out a model for a beautiful man, I scarcely +think they'd sculp you; but ef you do the fair thing by your country +you'll make as putty a angel as any of us! A. Linkin, use the talents +which Nature has put into you judishusly and firmly, and all will be well! +A. Linkin, adoo!" + +He shook me cordyully by the hand--we exchanged picters, so we could gaze +upon each others' liniments, when far away from one another--he at the +hellum of the ship of State, and I at the hellum of the show +bizniss--admittance only 15 cents. + + + + +Chapter IV: Some Lincoln Anecdotes + + +Let us now get back to that room in the White House again. After Lincoln +had finished reading from Ward's book we talked about the author. + +The two stories long accredited to Ward at which Mr. Lincoln laughed most +heartily that day included the anecdote of the gray-haired lover who hoped +to win a young wife and who, when asked by a neighbor how he was +progressing with his suit, answered, with enthusiasm, "All right." + +When the neighbor then asked, "Has she called you 'Honey' yet?" the old +man answered, "Well, not exactly that, but she called me the next thing to +it. She has called me 'Old Beeswax'!" + +Another story which Lincoln accredited to Ward had to do with a visit the +latter was supposed to have made in his country clothes and manners to a +fashionable evening party. Ward, not wishing to show the awkwardness he +felt, stepped boldly up to an aristocratic lady and said, "You are a very +handsome woman!" The woman took it to be an insulting piece of rude +flattery and replied, spitefully, "I wish I could say the same thing of +you!" Whereupon Ward boldly remarked, "Well, you could if you were as big +a liar as I am!" + +Ward once stated that Lincoln told him that he was an expert at raising +corn to fatten hogs, but, unfortunately for his creditors, they were his +neighbor's hogs. + +During this conversation the President sat leaning back in his desk chair +with one long leg thrown over a corner of the Cabinet table. He had +removed his right cuff--I presume to be better able to sign his name to +the various documents with which the table was littered--and he did not +trouble to put it on again. He wore a black frock coat very wrinkled and +shiny, and trousers of the same description. His necktie was black and +one end of it was caught under the flap of his turnover collar. Yet his +appearance did not give one an impression of disorder; rather he looked +like a neat workingman of the better sort. + +As I sat talking with the President a strong light flooded the Cabinet +Room through the great south windows. Outside one could see the Potomac +River sparkling in the bright winter sunshine. This strong illumination +revealed the deep lines of the President's face. He looked so haggard and +careworn after his long vigil (he had been at work since two o'clock in +the morning) that I said: + +"You are very tired. I ought not to stay here and talk to you." + +"Please sit still," he replied, quickly. "I am very tired and I can get +rested; and you are an excuse for not letting anybody else in until I do +get rested." + +So I understood the reason, or perhaps it would be fairer to say the +excuse, for granting me this remarkable privilege. + +Somehow the subject of education came up, and when Lincoln asked me if I +was a college man I told him I had left Yale College Law School to go to +war. Then he recounted an amusing experience which he once had in New +Haven. He went to the old New Haven House to spend the night, and was +given a room looking out on Chapel Street and the Green. Students were +seated on the rail of the fence across the street, singing. Mr. Lincoln +said that all he could remember of Yale College as a result of that visit +was a continual repetition in the song they were singing: + +"My old horse he came from Jerusalem, came from Jerusalem, came from +Jerusalem, leaning on the lamb." + +He said whimsically that he thought this was a good sample of college +education as he had found it. Yet the President did not belittle the +advantages to be gained by a college education properly and seriously +applied. He said he often felt that he had missed a great deal by his +failure to secure these advantages even though he thought the usual +college education was inadequate and very impractical. He had found in his +experience with the army that it took army officers from college just as +long to learn military science as it did a young man from a farm. + +Then the President asked me how I, as a poor farmer's boy, got along at +Yale. I told him I taught music in Yale to earn part of my living--dug +potatoes in the afternoon, and taught music in the evening. Then he got up +and walked up and down the room with his hands behind him, while he gave +me quite a discourse on his opinion of music, and especially of church +music. + +He said the inconsistency of church music was something that astonished +him: that if you go to any place other than a church the music is always +appropriate for the place and time. In the theater, for example, they +sing songs which have some connection with the acting. (Perhaps that +example would not apply to-day.) But in church very often there did not +seem to be any relation whatever between what the congregation or the +choir sings and the sermon. Then he told me about some "highfalutin' +songs" he had heard in church, which he said would be ridiculous if it was +not in church; he was disgusted with the lack of sacred art and of +appropriateness in church music. He finished by saying that he did not +favor "dance music at a funeral." There is a good deal of common sense in +that! + +I do not now recall just how the subject was introduced, but Lincoln +talked to me about dreams, and he said that while he could not see any +scientific reason for believing in dreams, nevertheless that he did in a +measure believe in them, although he could not explain why. He said that +they had undeniably influenced him. + +Then he spoke of dreams he had "since the war came on," which had +influenced him a great deal. He said, "There might not be much in dreams, +but when I dream we have been defeated it puts me on my nerve to watch out +and see how things are. Men may say dreams are of no account, but they are +suggestive to me, and in that respect of great account." + +When the President spoke of the people who were waiting to see him, I +said: + +"No doubt many of them, like myself, are strangers to you. How do you +select those you will let in when you can't see them all?" + +He replied that he decided a good deal by names, and then he told me what +seemed a good point to remember, that he had trained his memory in his +youth by determining to remember people's faces and names together. This +he had done when he was first elected to the legislature in Illinois. He +realized at once when he got into the legislature that he could not make a +speech like the rest of "those fellows," college people, but he could get +a personal acquaintance and great influence if he would remember +everybody's face and everybody's name; and so he said he had acted upon +the plan of carrying a memorandum book around with him and setting down +carefully the name of each man he met, and then making a little outline +sketch with his pencil of some feature of the man--his ears, nose, +shoulder, or something which would help him to remember. + +Lincoln then told me a story about James G. Blaine when the latter was +first elected to Congress. Blaine afterward repudiated this story, but it +serves to illustrate Lincoln's thought none the less. He said that Blaine +hired a private secretary to help him out in remembering people. His +system was to have the secretary meet all those who entered the reception +room and ask their names, where they lived, what families they belonged +to, and all the information that could be gained about them in a social +way. Then, according to the story, the secretary ran around to the back +door to Mr. Blaine's private office and gave him a full memorandum about +his callers. A few minutes later, when the visitor was ushered in, the +secretary told him to "walk right in to see Mr. Blaine." + +He would say in the most casual manner: "Mr. Blaine is in there. You can +go right in." + +Mr. Blaine would get up, shake hands with the man, ask him how his +relations were, how long it had been since he was in the legislature, +whether his wife's brother had been successful in the West, etc., until +the visitor came to be perfectly astounded. + +As a result of this Mr. Blaine became very famous for his memory of names. +But even if the story about the source of Blaine's "memory" is untrue, +Lincoln was probably ahead of him and, indeed, of any man in this country; +he could remember every person he had ever seen in twenty years' time. +That was one of the things that became evident when I asked him how he +could judge the visitors. In the majority of cases he had seen the man or +heard of him in some connection, perhaps years before. He also said that +he judged strangers by their names because when he heard their names he +would think of other people he did know by that name, and he judged they +might belong to that family and have the same traits. + +He admitted that he was sometimes guided by the suggestion of Artemus +Ward, who told him a story of a boys' club in Boston which did not take in +any members who were not Irish. A boy came along and asked to be admitted +to the club, and the members asked, "Are you Irish?" + +"Oh yes," replied the boy, "I am Irish." + +"What is your name?" + +"My name is Ikey Einstein." + +Lincoln, smiling, said, "The Irish boys kicked that boy out forthwith." + +He said, "Artemus Ward, when telling me that story, confirmed me in my +view that a name _does_ have something to do with the man. But," Lincoln +added, "if it is Smith, I have no way of getting at it." Then he said, +more seriously, that he had to be guided a great deal by an instinctive +impression of the visitor as he came in the door. + +"Seldom a person sits down at this table, or desk, but I have formed an +opinion of the man's disposition and traits, by an instinctive +impression." + +He acknowledged that he could not always trust to this, but was generally +guided by it and found he got along very well with it. Sometimes, however, +he did make a mistake, as when on one occasion he had talked to a man for +half an hour as though he was a hotel keeper, and found out afterward that +he was a preacher. + +Through all this conversation there had run an undercurrent of +whimsicality, partly, no doubt, the conscious effort of a sorely tried +mind to gain a few minutes' respite from its pressing cares, but none the +less showing a keen and deep-seated appreciation of the funny side of +life. Only once did this humor forsake him, and that was when Lincoln +spoke of Tad. The little boy had been playing quietly by himself all the +time--apparently he was as much at home in the Cabinet Room as in any +other part of the White House--and Lincoln told me Tad had been sick and +that it worried him. + +Then he put his head in both his hands, looked down at the table, and +said, "No man ought to wish to be President of the United States!" + +Still holding his head in his hands, he said to me, "Young man, do not +take a political office unless you are compelled to; there are times when +it is heart-crushing!" + +He said he had thought how many a mother and father had lost their +children in the war--just boys. + +"And I am so anxious about my Tad, I cannot help but think how they must +feel. If Tad had died--" + +He grew very sad; for a few minutes his face was gloomy, and it seemed as +though half a sob was coming up in his throat. + +Lincoln was not one of those men who go to the extremes of grief or the +extremes of joy; but other people have told me, as I myself now saw, that +when there came to him that seizure of deep sadness he had to fight +himself for a few minutes to overcome it. This impressed me that day very +deeply. Breaking off abruptly from what he had been talking about--war and +Artemus Ward--and speaking suddenly of Tad, he had dropped down in that +dejected position, and for a few minutes looked so sad I thought something +awful must suddenly have come to his mind. But it seemed, after all, to be +only the fear that Tad, who was not very well, might die. Who can say what +vistas of thought that idea may have opened. + + + + +Chapter V: What Made Him Laugh + + +To many persons it seemed incongruous that there should be any thought, +motive, or taste in common between Abraham Lincoln and the droll Artemus +Ward. Indeed, the great biographers of Lincoln have either ignored the +existence of Ward or have referred to him very sparingly. Yet no visitor +at the White House seemed more welcome than Ward during Lincoln's +administration. Mr. Seward, the Secretary of State, and Mr. Stanton, the +Secretary of War, were said to disapprove of Ward's frequent visits, and +it was whispered to Mrs. Ames, correspondent of the _Independent_, that +Lincoln hinted to Ward that it might be best to time his visits so as to +occur when Mrs. Lincoln was not at home. But it was a matter of common +gossip in "Newspaper Row" that there was a strong and true friendship +between the care-burdened President and the fun-making showman, whose real +name was Charles Farrar Browne. + +The strange contrast in their abilities, their dispositions, and their +careers puzzled the amateur psychoanalysts of that day. Was it merely an +example of the attraction of opposites? Lincoln was strong, athletic, and +enduring; Ward was weak, lazy, and changeable. Lincoln loved work; Ward +took the path of least resistance. Lincoln was a moderate eater and lived +firmly up to his principles as a teetotaler; Ward drank anything sold at a +bar and sometimes was too intoxicated to appear at his "wax-figger show." +Lincoln loved the classics and was a good judge of literature; Ward seldom +read a classic translation. Lincoln saved money and could carefully invest +it; Ward would not take the trouble to collect his own salary, and never +was known to make an investment. Lincoln laughed often, and on rare +occasions laughed long and loud; Ward never laughed in public and in his +funniest moods never even smiled. Lincoln's sad face, when in repose, +touched a chord of sympathy in the souls of those who knew him best. Yet +Hingston, who was Ward's best friend, said that Ward's cold stare awoke at +once cyclones of riotous laughter in his audiences. Lincoln was a great +patriotic leader of men and wielded the power of a monarch; Ward was a +quiet citizen, who loved his country, but had no desire for power or for +battles. Strong contrasts these. Yet in a deep and sincere friendship they +were agreed. + +Of the few cheerful things which entered Lincoln's life in those troubled +and gloomy times, the one which he enjoyed most was Ward's "Show." He +thought this was the most downright comical thing that had ever been put +before the public, and he laughed heartily even as he described it. Ward +had a nondescript collection of stuffed animals which he exhibited upon +the stage; he told the audience he found it cheaper to stuff the animals +once than to keep stuffing them continually. They consisted at one time of +a jack-rabbit and two mangy bears. He had also a picture of the Western +plains--the poorest one he could find. He would say, "The Indians in this +picture have not come along yet." + +One always expected him to lecture about his animals, but he never did; in +fact, he scarcely mentioned them. His manner was that of an utter idiot, +and his blank stare, when the audience laughed at something he had said, +was enough in itself to send the whole hall into paroxysms of mirth. +Lincoln said to me that day, "One glimpse of Ward would make a culprit +laugh when he was being hung." + +No doubt one reason why Lincoln felt kindly toward Ward was because the +latter was "most unselfishly trying to keep people cheerful in a most +depressing time. He and Nasby," the President said, "are furnishing about +all the cheerfulness we now have in this country." (Petroleum V. Nasby, it +will be remembered, was the pen name taken by David Ross Locke in his +witty letters from the "Confedrit Crossroads.") + +The humor of Ward may seem crude to us now, but in the dark days of '64 it +took something more potent than refined wit to make people laugh--just as +it took a series of ludicrous and not overrefined drawings to make England +laugh in 1916; and it must be borne in mind that while Ward's sayings were +homely and sometimes savored strongly of the frontier, they were never +coarse or insinuating. + +But after all, the best way to learn what Lincoln really thought of Ward +was to ask him, and I did exactly that. Also, I was careful to give close +heed to his words, that I might be able to write them down immediately +afterward. This, to the best of my recollection, was what Lincoln said: + +"I was told the other day by a Congressman from Maine that Ward was +driven partly insane in his early life by the drowning of his intended +bride in Norway Lake. I could feel _that_ in Ward's character somehow +before I was told about it. Ward seems at times so utterly forlorn. + +"Nothing draws on my feelings like such a calamity. I knew what it was +once. Yes! Yes! I know all about it. One never gets away from it. I must +ask Ward to tell me all about his trouble sometime. I think that is what +makes him so sad in appearances. Ward never laughs himself, unless he +thinks it is his duty to make other people laugh. He is surely right about +that. + +"Perhaps Ward's whisky drinking is all an attempt to drown his sorrow. Who +knows? It is a mighty mistake to go to drink for comfort. I should suppose +the memory of the woman, if she was one worth while, would keep him from +such a foolish habit. I've been right glad that I let the stuff alone. +There was plenty of it about. + +"Ward told me one day that he took to funny work as a makeshift for a +decent living; and that he found it to be an honest way to go about doing +good. I would have done that myself if I had not found harder work at the +law. + +"I have agreed with many people who think that Ward should be in some +trade or writing books. But I don't know about it. He has a special kind +of mind, and, rightly used, he would make an excellent teacher of mental +science. In one way of looking at it his life is wasted. But if he +refreshes and cheers other people as he does me, I can't see how he could +make a better investment of his life. I smile and smile here as one by one +the crowd passes me to shake hands, until it is a week before my face gets +straight. But it is a duty. _I could defeat our whole army to-morrow by +looking glum at a reception or by refusing to smile for three consecutive +hours._[2] Ward says he carries a bottle of sunshine in 'the other +pocket,' to treat his friends. I like that idea. + + [2] The italics are the author's.--ED. + +"Ward is dreadfully misunderstood by a lot of dull people. They insist on +taking him seriously. An old lady in Baltimore held me up one night after +I had told some of Artemus Ward's remarks, and she may not have forgiven +me yet. I told his tale of the rich land out in Iowa, where the farmer +threw a cucumber seed as far as he could and started out on a run for his +house. But the cucumber vine overtook him and he found a seed cucumber in +his pocket. + +"At that the old lady opened her eyes and mouth, but made no remark. Once +more I tried her, by telling how Ward knew a lady who went for a porous +plaster and the druggist told her to place it anywhere on her trunk. Not +having a trunk or box in the house, she put it on her bandbox, and the +next day reported that it was so powerful that it drew her pink bonnet all +out of shape. + +"That was more than the conscientious old saint could stand, and after +supper she called me aside and told me that I ought to know that man Ward, +or whoever it was, 'was an out-and-out liar.' + +"That makes me think of a colored preacher who worked here on the grounds +through the week, and who loved the deep waters of theology in which he +floundered daily. One evening I asked him why he did not laugh on Sunday, +and when he said it was because it was 'suthin' frivlus,' I told him that +the Bible said God laughed. + +"The old man came to the door several days after that and said, 'Marse +Linkum, I've been totin' dat yar Bible saying "God larfed," and I've +'cluded dat it mus' jes' tak' a joke as big as der universe ter mak God +larf. Dar ain't no sech jokes roun' dis yere White House on Sunday.' + +"Well, let us get back to Ward and begin _de novo_. And, by the way, that +was the first Latin phrase I ever heard. But I like Ward, because all his +fun and all his yarns are as clean as spring water. He doesn't insinuate +or suggest approval of evil. He doesn't ridicule true religion. He never +speaks slightingly or grossly of woman. He is a one-hundred-carat man in +his motives. I am often accredited with telling disgraceful barroom +stories, and sometimes see them in print, but I have no time to contradict +them. Perhaps people forget them soon. I hope so. I don't know how I came +by the name of a storyteller. It is not a fame I would seek. But I have +tried to use as many as I could find that were good so as to cheer up +people in this hard world. + +"Ward said that he did not know much about education in the schools, but +he had an idea the training there was more to make the child think quickly +and think accurately than to memorize facts. If that were the case he +thought a textbook on bright jokes would be a valuable addition to a +school curriculum. + +"Ward's sharp jokes _do_ discipline the mind. Ward told Tad last summer +that Adam was _snaked_ out of Eden, and that Goliath was surprised when +David hit him because such a thing never entered his head before. Ward +told Mr. Chase that his father was an artist who was true to life, for he +made a scarecrow so bad that the crows brought back the corn they had +stolen two years before. Ward believes that the riddles of Sampson, the +fables of Ęsop, the questions of Socrates, and sums in mathematics are all +mind awakeners similar in effect to the discipline of real humor." + +Knowing that Lincoln had suffered a nearly fatal heart blow in his youth +through the tragic death of his first love, I was interested, years after +this interview with the President, to learn that there had been a +startling occurrence of a very similar nature in the early life of Ward. +This has been almost universally overlooked. Even his most intimate +friends, including Robertson, Hingston, Setchell, Coe, Carleton, and +Rider, make no mention of the tragic death of one of Ward's earliest girl +friends, Maude Myrick, then residing with relatives in Norway, Maine. The +township of Norway adjoins Waterford, where Ward was born, and where he +lived until he was nineteen. None of Ward's biographers give details of +his early life on the farm, and none appear even to have heard of Maude +Myrick. + +In 1874 a reporter of the Boston _Daily Traveler_ was sent to Waterford to +find the living neighbors of Ward's family and write a sketch of the +village and people. In the report the barest mention was made of Maude +Myrick. It stated that a cousin of Ward's remembered that his early +infatuation for a girl in the adjoining township "broke him all up" when +she was accidentally drowned at the inlet of Norway Lake. Search for her +genealogy at this late date seems vain. Ward appears never to have +mentioned her name but once after her death, and that was on his own +dying bed. The only allusion possibly concerning her that he ever made was +a brief note in an autograph album, preserved in Portland, Maine, in which +he wrote: "As for opposites; the happiest place for me is Tiffin, and the +saddest is a bridge over the Norway brook." + +If the historian could be sure that the vague rumor was fact and that the +country lass and the farmer's son were lovers, that the place of her +sudden death at the bridge over the inlet to Norway Lake, halfway between +their homes, was their trysting place, it would make clear the chief +reason for Abraham Lincoln's tender interest in Artemus Ward. That fact +would also account in a large degree for Ward's eccentric, inimitable +humor. All the great humorists from Charles Lamb to Josh Billings were +broken-hearted in their youth. Great geniuses have often been developed by +the same sad experience. It often costs much to be truly great. + +Previous to his sixteenth year the life of Charles Farrar Browne was that +of a New England country boy with parents who were industrious, honest, +and poor. The family needs were not of the extreme kind which are found in +the slums of the city, but existence depended on incessant toil and the +most critical economy. Squire Browne, the father of the future "Artemus +Ward," was a farmer who could also use surveying instruments with the +skill of New England common sense. + +His mother was a strong, industrious woman of the Pilgrim Fathers stock. +She encouraged home study and made the long winter evenings the occasion +for moral and mental instruction. The district school was of little use to +her children, as they could "outteach the teacher." But Charlie was +educated beyond his years by the books which his parents brought into the +home. At fifteen years of age, his father having died two years +previously, he was sent to Skowhegan, Maine, to learn the trade of a +printer in the office of the Skowhegan _Clarion_. + +His parents had not intended that he should be permanently a printer; the +inability to care for the growing boy at home evidently induced them to +seek a trade for him by which he could earn a living while studying for +the ministry. But the tragic events or the unaccountable mental revolution +of those unrecorded years turned away all the hopes of his parents and +sent his soul into rebellion against such a career. Nevertheless, a deep +good nature remained intact and the altruistic qualities of his +disposition proved to be permanent. He wrote to Shillabar ("Mrs. +Partington") of Boston that "the man who has no care for fun himself has +more time to cheer up his neighbors." The only thing that ever cheered +Ward into chuckling laughter was to meditate by himself on the effect of a +squib or description he was composing on "some old codger on a barrel by +the country grocery." + +Ward was never contented or fully happy. He traveled about from place to +place, often leaving without collecting his wages. He was a typesetter and +reporter at Tiffin, Ohio, at Toledo, and at Cleveland. When Mr. J. W. Gray +of the Cleveland _Plain Dealer_ secured Ward's services as a reporter, +Ward was twenty-four years old and thought to be hopelessly indolent by +his previous employer. He soon became known as "that fool who writes for +the _Plain Dealer_"; and his comic situations and surprising arguments +were soon the general theme of conversation in the city. He was famous in +a month. + +It was there and then that he assumed the pen name of Artemus Ward. He +began to give his humorous public talks in 1862 and was successful from +the first evening. His writings for _Vanity Fair_, New York, and all his +lectures were clearly original. He could never be accused of plagiarism or +imitation. Indeed, no one on earth could repeat his lectures with success +or equal Ward in continual fun making. He often assumed the role of an +idiot, but at the same time made the wisest observations and the cutest +sarcasms. His appearance on the stage even before he made his mechanical +nod was greeted with loud, hearty, and prolonged laughter. The saddest +forgot his sorrow, the most sedate gentleman began to shake, and the +crusty old maid broke out into the Ha! Ha! of a girl of sixteen. + +We may read Ward's writings and feel something of his absurd humor when we +recall his posture as he stated solemnly that his wife's feet "were so +large that her toes came around the corner two minutes before she came +along"; but to feel the full force of the absurdity one needs to see +Ward's seeming impatience that anyone should take it as a joke or +disbelieve his plain statement. + +Some cynical persons saw in Lincoln's friendship a move to secure Ward's +influence as a popular writer for the help of his political party. Now +that Mr. Lincoln is more fully understood, no one would accuse him of any +such a hypocritical or unworthy motive. He would have been frank with Ward +even though the latter was needed to aid the sacred cause of human +liberty. + +Samuel Bowles of the Springfield _Republican_, writing on Artemus Ward's +death in 1866, said, "Ward is said not to have seen a well day after the +death of President Lincoln." It was a true friendship, beyond a doubt. + + + + +Chapter VI: Humor in the Political Situation + + +Among the articles published by Artemus Ward were the following references +to Lincoln's political life, which greatly pleased Mr. Lincoln. He often +showed the worn clippings to his intimate friends. They lose much of the +keen wit of their composition by the changes which the years have wrought +in their local setting. Almost every word had a humorous and wise +inference or thrust which cannot be recognized by the modern reader. But +they retain enough still to be wonderfully funny. + +The tattered clippings are no more, of course, but I have gone back to +Ward's book and give below the stories which so amused Lincoln. + + +JOY IN THE HOUSE OF WARD + +DEAR SIRS: + +I take my pen in hand to inform you that I am in a state of great bliss, +and trust these lines will find you injoyin the same blessins. I'm +reguvinated. I've found the immortal waters of yooth, so to speak, and am +as limber and frisky as a two-year-old steer, and in the futur them boys +which sez to me "go up, old Bawld hed," will do so at the peril of their +hazard, individooally. I'm very happy. My house is full of joy, and I have +to git up nights and larf! Sumtimes I ax myself "is it not a dream?" & +suthin withinto me sez "it air"; but when I look at them sweet little +critters and hear 'em squawk, I know it is a reality--2 realitys, I may +say--and I feel gay. + +I returnd from the Summer Campane with my unparaleld show of wax works and +livin wild Beests of Pray in the early part of this munth. The peple of +Baldinsville met me cordully and I immejitly commenst restin myself with +my famerly. The other nite while I was down to the tavurn tostin my shins +agin the bar room fire & amuzin the krowd with sum of my adventurs, who +shood cum in bare heded & terrible excited but Bill Stokes, who sez, sez +he, "Old Ward, there's grate doins up to your house." + +Sez I, "William, how so?" + +Sez he, "Bust my gizzud but it's grate doins," & then he larfed as if he'd +kill hisself. + +Sez I, risin and puttin on a austeer look, "William, I woodunt be a fool +if I had common cents." + +But he kept on larfin till he was black in the face, when he fell over on +to the bunk where the hostler sleeps, and in a still small voice sed, +"Twins!" I ashure you gents that the grass didn't grow under my feet on my +way home, & I was follered by a enthoosiastic throng of my feller +sitterzens, who hurrard for Old Ward at the top of their voises. I found +the house chock full of peple. Thare was Mis Square Baxter and her three +grown-up darters, lawyer Perkinses wife, Taberthy Ripley, young Eben +Parsuns, Deakun Simmuns folks, the Skoolmaster, Doctor Jordin, etsetterry, +etsetterry. Mis Ward was in the west room, which jines the kitchen. Mis +Square Baxter was mixin suthin in a dipper before the kitchin fire, & a +small army of female wimin were rushin wildly round the house with bottles +of camfire, peaces of flannil, &c. I never seed such a hubbub in my natral +born dase. I cood not stay in the west room only a minit, so strung up was +my feelins, so I rusht out and ceased my dubbel barrild gun. + +"What upon airth ales the man?" sez Taberthy Ripley. "Sakes alive, what +air you doin?" & she grabd me by the coat tales. "What's the matter with +you?" she continnerd. + +"Twins, marm," sez I, "twins!" + +"I know it," sez she, coverin her pretty face with her aprun. + +"Wall," sez I, "that's what's the matter with me!" + +"Wall, put down that air gun, you pesky old fool," sed she. + +"No, marm," sez I, "this is a Nashunal day. The glory of this here day +isn't confined to Baldinsville by a darn site. On yonder woodshed," sed I, +drawin myself up to my full hite and speakin in a show actin voice, "will +I fire a Nashunal saloot!" sayin whitch I tared myself from her grasp and +rusht to the top of the shed whare I blazed away until Square Baxter's +hired man and my son Artemus Juneyer cum and took me down by mane force. + +On returnin to the Kitchin I found quite a lot of peple seated be4 the +fire, a talkin the event over. They made room for me & I sot down. "Quite +a eppisode," sed Docter Jordin, litin his pipe with a red-hot coal. + +"Yes," sed I, "2 eppisodes, waying abowt 18 pounds jintly." + +"A perfeck coop de tat," sed the skoolmaster. + +"E pluribus unum, in proprietor persony," sed I, thinking I'd let him know +I understood furrin langwidges as well as he did, if I wasn't a +skoolmaster. + +"It is indeed a momentious event," sed young Eben Parsuns, who has been 2 +quarters to the Akademy. + +"I never heard twins called by that name afore," sed I, "But I spose it's +all rite." + +"We shall soon have Wards enuff," sed the editer of the Baldinsville +_Bugle of Liberty_, who was lookin over a bundle of exchange papers in the +corner, "to apply to the legislater for a City Charter!" + +"Good for you, old man!" sed I; "giv that air a conspickius place in the +next _Bugle_." + +"How redicklus," sed pretty Susan Fletcher, coverin her face with her +knittin work & larfin like all possest. + +"Wall, for my part," sed Jane Maria Peasley, who is the crossest old made +in the world, "I think you all act like a pack of fools." + +Sez I, "Mis. Peasly, air you a parent?" + +Sez she, "No, I ain't." + +Sez I, "Mis. Peasly, you never will be." + +She left. + +We sot there talkin & larfin until "the switchin hour of nite, when grave +yards yawn & Josts troop 4th," as old Bill Shakespire aptlee obsarves in +his dramy of John Sheppard, esq, or the Moral House Breaker, when we broke +up & disbursed. + +Muther & children is a doin well & as Resolushhuns is the order of the day +I will feel obleeged if you'll insurt the follerin-- + +Whereas, two Eppisodes has happined up to the undersined's house, which is +Twins; & Whereas I like this stile, sade twins bein of the male perswashun +& both boys; there4 Be it-- + +_Resolved_, That to them nabers who did the fare thing by sade Eppisodes +my hart felt thanks is doo. + +_Resolved_, That I do most hartily thank Engine Ko. No. 17, who, under the +impreshun from the fuss at my house on that auspishus nite that thare was +a konflagration goin on, kum galyiantly to the spot, but kindly refraned +from squirtin. + +_Resolved_, That frum the Bottum of my Sole do I thank the Baldinsville +brass band fur givin up the idea of Sarahnadin me, both on that great nite +& sinse. + +_Resolved_, That my thanks is doo several members of the Baldinsville +meetin house who for 3 whole dase hain't kalled me a sinful skoffer or +intreeted me to mend my wicked wase and jine sade meetin house to onct. + +_Resolved_, That my Boozum teams with meny kind emoshuns towards the +follerin individoouls, to whit namelee--Mis. Square Baxter, who Jenerusly +refoozed to take a sent for a bottle of camfire; lawyer Perkinses wife who +rit sum versis on the Eppisodes; the Editer of the Baldinsville _Bugle of +Liberty_, who nobly assisted me in wollupin my Kangeroo, which sagashus +little cuss seriusly disturbed the Eppisodes by his outrajus screetchins +& kickins up; Mis. Hirum Doolittle, who kindly furnisht sum cold vittles +at a tryin time, when it wasunt konvenient to cook vittles at my hous; & +the Peasleys, Parsunses & Watsunses fur there meny ax of kindness. + + Trooly yures, + ARTEMUS WARD. + + +THE CRISIS + +[This Oration was delivered before the commencement of the war] + +On returnin to my humsted in Baldinsville, Injianny, resuntly, my feller +sitterzens extended a invite for me to norate to 'em on the Krysis. I +excepted & on larst Toosday nite I peared be4 a C of upturned faces in the +Red Skool House. I spoke nearly as follers: + +Baldinsvillins: Heartto4, as I have numerously obsarved, I have abstrained +from having any sentimunts or principles, my pollertics, like my religion, +bein of a exceedin accommodatin character. But the fack can't be no +longer disgised that a Krysis is onto us, & I feel it's my dooty to accept +your invite for one consecutive nite only. I spose the inflammertory +individooals who assisted in projucing this Krysis know what good she will +do, but I ain't 'shamed to state that I don't scacely. But the Krysis is +hear. She's bin hear for sevral weeks, & Goodness nose how long she'll +stay. But I venter to assert that she's rippin things. She's knockt trade +into a cockt up hat and chaned Bizness of all kinds tighter nor I ever +chaned any of my livin wild Beests. Alow me to hear dygress & stait that +my Beests at presnt is as harmless as the newborn Babe. Ladys & gentlemen +neen't hav no fears on that pint. To resoom--Altho I can't exactly see +what good this Krysis can do, I can very quick say what the origernal cawz +of her is. The origernal cawz is Our Afrikan Brother. I was into BARNIM'S +Moozeum down to New York the other day & saw that exsentric Etheopian, +the What Is It. Sez I, "Mister What Is It, you folks air raisin thunder +with this grate country. You're gettin to be ruther more numeris than +interestin. It is a pity you coodent go orf sumwhares by yourselves, & be +a nation of What Is Its, tho' if you'll excoose me, I shooden't care about +marryin among you. No dowt you're exceedin charmin to hum, but your stile +of luvliness isn't adapted to this cold climit." He larfed into my face, +which rather Riled me, as I had been perfeckly virtoous and respectable in +my observashuns. So sez I, turnin a leetle red in the face, I spect, "Do +you hav the unblushin impoodents to say you folks haven't raised a big +mess of thunder in this brite land, Mister What Is It?" He larfed agin, +wusser nor be4, whareupon I up and sez, "Go home, Sir, to Afriky's burnin +shores & taik all the other What Is Its along with you. Don't think we can +spair your interestin picters. You What Is Its air on the pint of smashin +up the gratest Guv'ment ever erected by man, & you actooally hav the +owdassity to larf about it. Go home, you low cuss!" + +I was workt up to a high pitch, & I proceeded to a Restorator & cooled orf +with some little fishes biled in ile--I b'leeve thay call 'em sardeens. + +Feller Sitterzuns, the Afrikan may be Our Brother. Sevral hily respectyble +gentlemen, and sum talentid females tell us so, & fur argyment's sake I +mite be injooced to grant it, tho' I don't beleeve it myself. But the +Afrikan isn't our sister & our wife & our uncle. He isn't sevral of our +brothers & all our fust wife's relashuns. He isn't our grandfather, and +our grate grandfather, and our Aunt in the country. Scacely. & yit numeris +persons would have us think so. It's troo he runs Congress & sevral other +public grosserys, but then he ain't everybody & everybody else likewise. +[Notiss to bizness men of VANITY FAIR: Extry charg fur this larst remark. +It's a goak.--A. W.] + +But we've got the Afrikan, or ruther he's got us, & now what air we going +to do about it? He's a orful noosanse. Praps he isn't to blame fur it. +Praps he was creatid fur sum wise purpuss, like the measles and New Englan +Rum, but it's mity hard to see it. At any rate he's no good here, & as I +statid to Mister What Is It, it's a pity he cooden't go orf sumwhares +quietly by hisself, whare he cood wear red weskits & speckled neckties, & +gratterfy his ambishun in varis interestin wase, without havin a eternal +fuss kickt up about him. + +Praps I'm bearing down too hard upon Cuffy. Cum to think on it, I am. He +woodn't be sich a infernal noosanse if white peple would let him alone. He +mite indeed be interestin. And now I think of it, why can't the white +peple let him alone. What's the good of continnerly stirrin him up with a +ten-foot pole? He isn't the sweetest kind of Perfoomery when in a natral +stait. + +Feller Sitterzens, the Union's in danger. The black devil Disunion is +trooly here, starin us all squarely in the fase! We must drive him back. +Shall we make a 2nd Mexico of ourselves? Shall we sell our birthrite for a +mess of potash? Shall one brother put the knife to the throat of anuther +brother? Shall we mix our whisky with each other's blud? Shall the star +spangled Banner be cut up into dishcloths? Standin here in this here +Skoolhouse, upon my nativ shore so to speak, I anser--Nary! + +Oh you fellers who air raisin this row, & who in the fust place startid +it, I'm 'shamed of you. The Showman blushes for you, from his boots to the +topmost hair upon his wenerable hed. + +Feller Sitterzens: I am in the Sheer & Yeller leaf. I shall peg out 1 of +these dase. But while I do stop here I shall stay in the Union. I know not +what the supervizers of Baldinsville may conclude to do, but for one, I +shall stand by the Stars & Stripes. Under no circumstances whatsomever +will I sesesh. Let every Stait in the Union sesesh & let Palmetter flags +flote thicker nor shirts on Square Baxter's close line, still will I +stick to the good old flag. The country may go to the devil, but I won't! +And next Summer when I start out on my campane with my Show, wharever I +pitch my little tent, you shall see floatin prowdly from the center pole +thereof the Amerikan Flag, with nary a star wiped out, nary a stripe less, +but the same old flag that has allers flotid thar! & the price of admishun +will be the same it allers was--15 cents, children half price. + +Feller Sitterzens, I am dun. Accordingly I squatted. + + +WAX FIGURES _VERSUS_ SHAKSPEARE + +ONTO THE WING----1859. + +MR. EDITOR. + +I take my Pen in hand to inform yu that I'm in good helth and trust these +few lines will find yu injoyin the same blessins. I wood also state that +I'm now on the summir kampane. As the Poit sez-- + + ime erflote, ime erflote + On the Swift rollin tied + An the Rovir is free. + +Bizness is scacely middlin, but Sirs I manige to pay for my foode and +raiment puncktooally and without no grumblin. The barked arrers of slandur +has bin leviled at the undersined moren onct sins heze bin into the show +bizness, but I make bold to say no man on this footstule kan troothfully +say I ever ronged him or eny of his folks. I'm travelin with a tent, which +is better nor hirin hauls. My show konsists of a serious of wax works, +snakes, a paneramy kalled a Grand Movin Diarea of the War in the Crymear, +komic songs and the Cangeroo, which larst little cuss continners to +konduct hisself in the most outrajus stile. I started out with the idear +of makin my show a grate Moral Entertainment, but I'm kompeled to sware so +much at that air infurnal Kangeroo that I'm frade this desine will be +flustratid to some extent. And while speakin of morrality, remines me that +sum folks turn up their nosis at shows like mine, sayin they is low and +not fit to be patrernized by peple of high degree. Sirs, I manetane that +this is infernal nonsense. I manetane that wax figgers is more elevatin +than awl the plays ever wroten. Take Shakespeer for instunse. Peple think +heze grate things, but I kontend heze quite the reverse to the kontrary. +What sort of sense is thare to King Leer, who goze round cussin his +darters, chawin hay and throin straw at folks, and larfin like a silly old +koot and makin a ass of hisself ginerally? Thare's Mrs. Mackbeth--sheze a +nise kind of woomon to have round ain't she, a puttin old Mack, her +husband, up to slayin Dunkan with a cheeze knife, while heze payin a +frendly visit to their house. O its hily morral, I spoze, when she larfs +wildly and sez, "gin me the daggurs--Ile let his bowels out," or wurds to +that effeck--I say, this is awl, strickly, propper, I spoze? That Jack +Fawlstarf is likewise a immoral old cuss, take him how ye may, and Hamlick +is as crazy as a loon. Thare's Richurd the Three, peple think heze grate +things, but I look upon him in the lite of a monkster. He kills everybody +he takes a noshun to in kold blud, and then goze to sleep in his tent. +Bimeby he wakes up and yells for a hoss so he kan go orf and kill sum more +peple. If he isent a fit spesserman for the gallers then I shood like to +know whare you find um. Thare's Iargo who is more ornery nor pizun. See +how shameful he treated that hily respecterble injun gentlemun, Mister +Otheller, makin him for to beleeve his wife was too thick with Casheo. +Obsarve how Iargo got Casheo drunk as a biled owl on corn whiskey in order +to karry out his sneckin desines. See how he wurks Mister Otheller's +feelins up so that he goze and makes poor Desdemony swaller a piller which +cawses her deth. But I must stop. At sum futur time I shall continner my +remarks on the drammer in which I shall show the varst supeeriority of wax +figgers and snakes over theater plays, in a interlectooal pint of view. + + Very Respectively yures, + A WARD, T. K. + + +THE SHAKERS + +The Shakers is the strangest religious sex I ever met. I'd hearn tell of +'em and I'd seen 'em, with their broad brim'd hats and long wastid coats; +but I'd never cum into immejit contack with 'em, and I'd sot 'em down as +lackin intelleck, as I'd never seen 'em to my Show--leastways, if they cum +they was disgised in white peple's close, so I didn't know 'em. + +But in the Spring of 18--, I got swampt in the exterior of New York State, +one dark and stormy night, when the winds Blue pityusly, and I was forced +to tie up with the Shakers. + +I was toilin threw the mud, when in the dim vister of the futer I obsarved +the gleams of a taller candle. Tiein a hornet's nest to my off hoss's tail +to kinder encourage him, I soon reached the place. I knockt at the door, +which it was opened unto me by a tall, slick-faced, solum lookin +individooal, who turn'd out to be a Elder. + +"Mr. Shaker," sed I, "you see before you a Babe in the woods, so to speak, +and he axes shelter of you." + +"Yay," sed the Shaker, and he led the way into the house, another Shaker +bein sent to put my hosses and waggin under kiver. + +A solum female, lookin sumwhat like a last year's bean-pole stuck into a +long meal bag, cum in and axed me was I a thurst and did I hunger? to +which I urbanely anserd "a few." She went orf and I endeverd to open a +conversashun with the old man. + +"Elder, I spect?" sed I. + +"Yay," he said. + +"Helth's good, I reckon?" + +"Yay." + +"What's the wages of a Elder, when he understans his bisness--or do you +devote your sarvices gratooitus?" + +"Yay." + +"Stormy night, sir." + +"Yay." + +"If the storm continners there'll be a mess underfoot, hay?" + +"Yay." + +"It's onpleasant when there's a mess underfoot?" + +"Yay." + +"If I may be so bold, kind sir, what's the price of that pecooler kind of +weskit you wear, incloodin trimmins?" + +"Yay!" + +I pawsd a minit, and then, thinkin I'd be faseshus with him and see how +that would go, I slapt him on the shoulder, bust into a harty larf, and +told him that as a _yayer_ he had no livin ekal. + +He jumpt up as if Billin water had bin squirted into his ears, groaned, +rolled his eyes up tords the sealin and sed: "You're a man of sin!" He +then walkt out of the room. + +Jest then the female in the meal bag stuck her hed into the room and +statid that refreshments awaited the weary travler, and I sed if it was +vittles she ment the weary travler was agreeable, and I follored her into +the next room. + +I sot down to the table and the female in the meal bag pored out sum tea. +She sed nothin, and for five minutes the only live thing in that room was +a old wooden clock, which tickt in a subdood and bashful manner in the +corner. This dethly stillness made me oneasy, and I determined to talk to +the female or bust. So sez I, "marrige is agin your rules, I bleeve, +marm?" + +"Yay." + +"The sexes liv strickly apart, I spect?" + +"Yay." + +"It's kinder singler," sez I, puttin on my most sweetest look and speakin +in a winnin voice, "that so fair a made as thow never got hitched to some +likely feller." [N. B.--She was upwards of 40 and homely as a stump fence, +but I thawt I'd tickil her.] + +"I don't like men!" she sed, very short. + +"Wall, I dunno," sez I, "they're a rayther important part of the +populashun. I don't scacely see how we could git along without 'em." + +"Us poor wimin folks would git along a grate deal better if there was no +men!" + +"You'll excoos me, marm, but I don't think that air would work. It +wouldn't be regler." + +"I'm fraid of men!" she sed. + +"That's onnecessary, marm. _You_ ain't in no danger. Don't fret yourself +on that pint." + +"Here we're shot out from the sinful world. Here all is peas. Here we air +brothers and sisters. We don't marry and consekently we hav no domestic +difficulties. Husbans don't abooze their wives--wives don't worrit their +husbans. There's no children here to worrit us. Nothin to worrit us here. +No wicked matrimony here. Would thow like to be a Shaker?" + +"No," sez I, "it ain't my stile." + +I had now histed in as big a load of pervishuns as I could carry +comfortable, and, leanin back in my cheer, commenst pickin my teeth with +a fork. The female went out, leavin me all alone with the clock. I hadn't +sot thar long before the Elder poked his hed in at the door. "You're a man +of sin!" he sed, and groaned and went away. + +Directly thar cum in two young Shakeresses, as putty and slick lookin gals +as I ever met. It is troo they was drest in meal bags like the old one I'd +met previsly, and their shiny, silky har was hid from sight by long white +caps, sich as I spose female Josts wear; but their eyes sparkled like +diminds, their cheeks was like roses, and they was charmin enuff to make a +man throw stuns at his granmother if they axed him to. They comenst +clearin away the dishes, castin shy glances at me all the time. I got +excited. I forgot Betsy Jane in my rapter, and sez I, "my pretty dears, +how air you?" + +"We air well," they solumnly sed. + +"Whar's the old man?" sed I, in a soft voice. + +"Of whom dost thow speak--Brother Uriah?" + +"I mean the gay and festiv cuss who calls me a man of sin. Shouldn't +wonder if his name was Uriah." + +"He has retired." + +"Wall, my pretty dears," sez I, "let's have sum fun. Let's play puss in +the corner. What say?" + +"Air you a Shaker, sir?" they axed. + +"Wall, my pretty dears, I haven't arrayed my proud form in a long weskit +yit, but if they was all like you perhaps I'd jine 'em. As it is, I'm a +Shaker protemporary." + +They was full of fun. I seed that at fust, only they was a leetle skeery. +I tawt 'em Puss in the corner and sich like plase, and we had a nice time, +keepin quiet of course so the old man shouldn't hear. When we broke up, +sez I, "my pretty dears, ear I go you hav no objections, hav you, to a +innersent kiss at partin?" + +"Yay," they sed, and I _yay'd_. + +I went up stairs to bed. I spose I'd bin snoozin half an hour when I was +woke up by a noise at the door. I sot up in bed, leanin on my elbers and +rubbin my eyes, and I saw the follerin picter: The Elder stood in the +doorway, with a taller candle in his hand. He hadn't no wearin appeerel on +except his night close, which flutterd in the breeze like a Seseshun flag. +He sed, "You're a man of sin!" then groaned and went away. + +I went to sleep agin, and drempt of runnin orf with the pretty little +Shakeresses mounted on my Californy Bar. I thawt the Bar insisted on +steerin strate for my dooryard in Baldinsville and that Betsy Jane cum out +and giv us a warm recepshun with a panfull of Bilin water. I was woke up +arly by the Elder. He sed refreshments was reddy for me down stairs. Then +sayin I was a man of sin, he went groanin away. + +As I was goin threw the entry to the room where the vittles was, I cum +across the Elder and the old female I'd met the night before, and what +d'ye spose they was up to? Huggin and kissin like young lovers in their +gushingist state. Sez I, "my Shaker frends, I reckon you'd better suspend +the rules and git married." + +"You must excoos Brother Uriah," sed the female; "he's subjeck to fits and +hain't got no command over hisself when he's into 'em." + +"Sartinly," sez I, "I've bin took that way myself frequent." + +"You're a man of sin!" sed the Elder. + +Arter breakfust my little Shaker frends cum in agin to clear away the +dishes. + +"My pretty dears," sez I, "shall we _yay_ agin?" + +"Nay," they sed, and I _nay'd_. + +The Shakers axed me to go to their meetin, as they was to hav sarvices +that mornin, so I put on a clean biled rag and went. The meetin house was +as neat as a pin. The floor was white as chalk and smooth as glass. The +Shakers was all on hand, in clean weskits and meal bags, ranged on the +floor like milingtery companies, the mails on one side of the room and the +females on tother. They commenst clappin their hands and singin and +dancin. They danced kinder slow at fust, but as they got warmed up they +shaved it down very brisk, I tell you. Elder Uriah, in particler, +exhiberted a right smart chance of spryness in his legs, considerin his +time of life, and as he cum a dubble shuffle near where I sot, I rewarded +him with a approvin smile and sed: "Hunky boy! Go it, my gay and festiv +cuss!" + +"You're a man of sin!" he sed, continnerin his shuffle. + +The Sperret, as they called it, then moved a short fat Shaker to say a few +remarks. He sed they was Shakers and all was ekal. They was the purest and +Seleckest peple on the yearth. Other peple was sinful as they could be, +but Shakers was all right. Shakers was all goin kerslap to the Promist +Land, and nobody want goin to stand at the gate to bar 'em out, if they +did they'd git run over. + +The Shakers then danced and sung agin, and arter they was threw, one of +'em axed me what I thawt of it. + +Sez I, "What duz it siggerfy?" + +"What?" sez he. + +"Why this jumpin up and singin? This long weskit bizniss, and this +anty-matrimony idee? My frends, you air neat and tidy. Your hands is +flowin with milk and honey. Your brooms is fine, and your apple sass is +honest. When a man buys a keg of apple sass of you he don't find a grate +many shavins under a few layers of sass--a little Game I'm sorry to say +sum of my New Englan ancesters used to practiss. Your garding seeds is +fine, and if I should sow 'em on the rock of Gibralter probly I should +raise a good mess of garding sass. You air honest in your dealins. You air +quiet and don't distarb nobody. For all this I givs you credit. But your +religion is small pertaters, I must say. You mope away your lives here in +single retchidness, and as you air all by yourselves nothing ever +conflicks with your pecooler idees, except when Human Nater busts out +among you, as I understan she sumtimes do. [I giv Uriah a sly wink here, +which made the old feller squirm like a speared Eel.] You wear long +weskits and long faces, and lead a gloomy life indeed. No children's +prattle is ever hearn around your harthstuns--you air in a dreary fog all +the time, and you treat the jolly sunshine of life as tho' it was a thief, +drivin it from your doors by them weskits, and meal bags, and pecooler +noshuns of yourn. The gals among you, sum of which air as slick pieces of +caliker as I ever sot eyes on, air syin to place their heds agin weskits +which kiver honest, manly harts, while you old heds fool yerselves with +the idee that they air fulfillin their mishun here, and air contented. +Here you air all pend up by yerselves, talkin about the sins of a world +you don't know nothin of. Meanwhile said world continners to resolve +round on her own axeltree onct in every 24 hours, subjeck to the +Constitution of the United States, and is a very plesant place of +residence. It's a unnatral, onreasonable and dismal life you're leadin +here. So it strikes me. My Shaker frends, I now bid you a welcome adoo. +You have treated me exceedin well. Thank you kindly, one and all. + +"A base exhibiter of depraved monkeys and onprincipled wax works!" sed +Uriah. + +"Hello, Uriah," sez I, "I'd most forgot you. Wall, look out for them fits +of yourn, and don't catch cold and die in the flour of your youth and +beauty." + +And I resoomed my jerney. + + +HIGH-HANDED OUTRAGE AT UTICA + +In the Faul of 1856, I showed my show in Utiky, a trooly grate sitty in +the State of New York. + +The people gave me a cordyal recepshun. The press was loud in her prases. + +1 day as I was givin a descripshun of my Beests and Snaiks in my usual +flowry stile what was my skorn disgust to see a big burly feller walk up +to the cage containin my wax figgers of the Lord's Last Supper, and cease +Judas Iscarrot by the feet and drag him out on the ground. He then +commenced fur to pound him as hard as he cood. + +"What under the son are you abowt?" cried I. + +Sez he, "What did you bring this pussylanermus cuss here fur?" and he hit +the wax figger another tremenjis blow on the hed. + +Sez I, "You egrejus ass, that air's a wax figger--a representashun of the +false 'Postle." + +Sez he, "That's all very well for you to say, but I tell you, old man, +that Judas Iscarrot can't show hisself in Utiky with impunerty by a darn +site!" with which observashun he kaved in Judassis bed. The young man +belonged to 1 of the first famerlies in Utiky. I sood him, and the Joory +brawt in a verdick of Arson in the 3d degree. + + + + +Chapter VII: Why Lincoln Loved Laughter + + +Only once in the course of our long and rambling conversation did Lincoln +refer to the war. That was when he asked me how the soldiers' spirits were +keeping up. He said he had been giving out so much cheer to the generals +and Congressmen that he had pumped himself dry and must take in a new +supply from some source at once. He declared that his "ear bones ached" to +hear a good peal of honest laughter. It was difficult, he said, to laugh +in any acceptable manner when soldiers were dying and widows weeping, but +he must laugh soon even if he had to go down cellar to do it. He asked me +if I had thought how sacred a thing was a loving smile, and how important +it often was to laugh. Then he told how some Union officers in +reconnoitering had heard the Confederates laughing loudly over a game, and +returned cast down with fear of some sudden and successful attack by the +cheerful enemy. That laughter actually postponed a great battle for which +the Union soldiers had been prepared. + +When, as I later ascertained, I had been with the President for almost two +hours, he suddenly straightened up in his chair, remarked that he "felt +much better now," and with a friendly but firm, "Good morning," turned +back to the papers before him on the table. This sounds abrupt as it is +told, but there was a homeliness and simplicity about everything Lincoln +did which robbed the action of any suspicion of discourtesy. One does not +shake hands with a member of his own family on merely quitting a room, and +I felt that a ceremonious dismissal would have been equally uncalled for +in this case. Perhaps I really should say that is the way I feel now; at +the time I did not think of the matter at all because what was done seemed +perfectly natural and proper. + +In the anteroom the crowd was greater, if anything, than when I had gone +in. Among those callers there were certain to be some who would bring +trouble and vexation aplenty to the President. It was in preparation for +this that he had been resting himself, like a boxer between the rounds of +a bout. One would make a great error by supposing that Lincoln's normal +manner was that which he had exhibited to me. He could be soft and +tender-hearted as any woman, but within that kindly nature there lay +gigantic strength and the capacity for the most decisive action. He could +speak slowly and weigh his words when occasion demanded, but his usual +manner was vigorous and prompt--so much so that at times his speech had a +quality which might fairly be described as explosive. + +This was because he always knew exactly what he wanted to say. He thought +out each problem to the end and decided it; then he left that and did not +trouble his mind about it any more, but took up something else. This habit +of disciplined thinking gave him a great advantage over most people, who +mix their thinking and try to carry on a dozen mental processes all at +once. + +Lincoln realized the importance of mental discipline and he gave to humor +a high place as an aid to its attainment. I have already told how, in +discussing Artemus Ward with me, he said Ward was really an educator, for +he understood that the purpose of education was to discipline the mind, to +enable a man to think quickly and accurately in all circumstances of life. +I hope the reader will bear with me if I repeat some of the points which +Lincoln made then, because they show so clearly why he valued humor. +Lincoln said that much of Ward's humor was of the educational sort. It +aroused intellectual activity of the finest kind, and he mentioned Ward's +constant use of riddles as an illustration. Then he spoke of the ancient +Samson riddle and the fables of Ęsop, and called attention to the fact +that they employed a joke to train the mind by the study of keen satire. +He said Ward was like that. It seems that Tad came to Ward at the table +one day after he had heard somewhere a joke about Adam in Eden. So he said +to Mr. Ward, "How did Adam get out of Eden?" + +Ward had never heard the conundrum and did not give the answer Tad +expected, but he had one of his own, for he exclaimed "Adam was 'snaked' +out." It took Tad some little time to fathom this reply and gave him some +splendid mental exercise. Mr. Lincoln said he did not see why they did not +have a course of humor in the schools. It was characteristic of his great +modesty that whenever he referred to school or to college Lincoln always +tried to limit himself by saying that, as he did not know what they did +learn there, he was not an authority on the subject, but that +such-and-such a thing was just "his notion." + +If discipline was a subjective purpose in Lincoln's use of humor, it may +be said with equal certainty that the illustrative power of a well-told +story was the principal objective use to which he put it. Lincoln seems +never to have told a story simply to relate it; everyone he told had an +application aside from the story itself. There is something profoundly +elemental about this; it is like the use of the parable in the teachings +of Christ. + +Astute minds, capable of grasping the meaning of facts without +illustration, sometimes resented this habit of the President's; some of +the sharpest criticism, as might be expected, came from within the Cabinet +itself; but there can certainly be no just foundation for the statement +that Lincoln detained a full session of the Cabinet to read them two +chapters in Artemus Ward's book. He was not frivolous or shallow. His +reverence for great men, for great thoughts, and for great occasions was +most sensitively acute. He recognized the fact that "brevity is the soul +of wit," and would not have done more than use a condensed and brief +reference to Ward, at most. We know that on another occasion he made most +effective use at a Cabinet meeting of Ward's burlesque on Shaw patriotism +when he quoted Ward as saying that he "was willing, if need be, to +sacrifice all his wife's relations for his country." + +An even better example of the President's use of humor is the following +story which he once told to illustrate the military situation existing at +the time. A bull was chasing a farmer around a tree. The farmer finally +got hold of the bull's tail, and both started off across the field. The +farmer could not let go for fear he would fall and break his head, but he +called out to the bull, "Who started this mess, anyway?" Lincoln said he +had gotten hold of the bull by the tail and that while the Confederacy was +running away he dared not let go. This summed up the situation in a way +the whole country could understand. + +It is an interesting fact, and one not generally known, that Lincoln +committed almost every good story he heard to writing. If his old +notebooks could be found they would make a wonderful volume, but, +unfortunately, they have never come to light. Perhaps he felt ashamed of +them, as he did of his rough draft of the Gettysburg address, which he had +scribbled on the margin of a newspaper in the morning while riding to +Gettysburg on the train. + +There was one source of Lincoln's humor--and perhaps it was the chief +one--which flowed from the very bedrock of his nature. That was the desire +to bring cheer to others. When he was passing through the very Valley of +the Shadow after the tragic end of the single love affair of his youth a +true friend told him that he had no right to look so glum--that it "was +his solemn duty to be cheerful," to cheer up others. Young Abe took the +lesson to heart, and he never forgot it. Incidentally, it was the means of +restoring him to health and probably of preserving his sanity--as the old +saint who gave him the lecture no doubt intended that it should. + +In their common experience of an awful grief and in their ability to rise +above its devastation purged of selfishness and devoted to a career of +service, each according to his own gifts, Abraham Lincoln and Charles +Farrar Browne had followed the same path, and it was from this that there +sprang that deep and true bond of sympathy between the two men which +mystified so many even of those who considered themselves Lincoln's +intimates. Where another saw but the cap and bells, Lincoln saw and +reverenced the tortured, struggling soul within. + +During our memorable talk on that December day in 1864 when the cares of +state were pressing so sorely upon him, the President told me that he was +greatly relieved in times of personal distress by trying to cheer up +somebody else. He spoke of it as being both selfish and unselfish. He said +he had been accused of telling thousands of stories he had never heard of, +but that he told stories to cheer the downhearted and tried to remember +stories that were cheerful to relate to people in discouraged +circumstances. He reminded me that his first practice of the law was among +very poor people. He tried to tell stories to his clients who were +discouraged, to give them courage, and he found the habit grew upon him +until he had to "draw in" and decline to use so many stories. + +Bob Burdett, writing for the Burlington _Hawkeye_ shortly after the +President's death on April 15, 1865, said that Abraham Lincoln's humorous +anecdotes would soon die, but that Lincoln's humor, like John Brown's +soul, would be ever "marching on." No printed story which he told ever +expressed the soul of Lincoln fully. His own partial description of humor +as "that indefinable, intangible grace of spirit," is not to be found +exemplified in his published speeches. It is in the spirit which animated +them rather than in the works themselves that we must look for the vital +principle of Lincoln's humorous sayings. + +To attempt the analysis of humor is as if a philosopher should try to put +a glance of love into a geometrical diagram or the soul of music into a +plaster cast. No one by searching can find it and no one by labor can +secure it. Yet so simple, so homely, and withal so shrewd was the humor of +Abraham Lincoln that one can easily picture him turning over in his mind +the words of his favorite quotation from the "Merchant of Venice"--one of +the few classical quotations he ever used--while he reflected, half +sadly, upon the cynicism and pettiness of mankind: + + "Nature hath framed strange fellows in her time, + Some that will evermore peep through their eyes + And laugh like parrots at a bagpiper; + And others of such vinegar aspect + That they'll not show their teeth in way of smile + Though Nestor swear the jest be laughable." + + + + +Chapter VIII: Lincoln and John Brown + + +"This is my friend!" said Lincoln, as he suddenly turned to a pile of +books beside him and grasped a Japanese vase containing a large open pond +lily. Some horticultural admirer, knowing Lincoln's love for that special +flower, had sent in from his greenhouse a specimen of the _Castilia +odorata_. The President put his left arm affectionately around the vase as +he inclined his head to the lily and drew in the unequaled fragrance with +a long, deep breath. + +"I have never had the time to study flowers as I often wished to do," he +said. "But for some strange reason I am captivated by the pond lily. It +may be because some one told me that my mother admired them." + +Sitting at this desk now, looking out on the Berkshire Hills and living +over in memory that visit to the White House, I see again the tableau of +the President looking down into the face of that glorious flower. He +hugged the vase closer and repeated tenderly, "This is my friend!" + +In reverie and in dreams I have meditated long, searching for some +satisfactory reason why that particular bloom was Lincoln's dear friend. +Yet the reason, whatever it may be, matters not so much as the fact. +Lincoln loved the lily and called it his friend. No mere sensuous +admiration of beauty, this, but a deep sense of its spiritual +significance. By its perfection the lily achieved personality, and that +personality, so simple, so pure, so exquisite, struck a responsive chord +in the heart of this man whom his cultured contemporaries called uncouth! +On the plane of the spirit they met as friends. + +Great gifts have their price. From Lincoln's sensitive tenderness sprang +the suffering which he bore, both in his early life and during the living +martyrdom of his years in the White House. But as if to offset somewhat +this terrible burden was added the divine gift of humor. + +It has been often remarked that humor and pathos are closely akin. The +greatest humorists are also the greatest masters of pathos. Perhaps Mark +Twain's greatest work was his _Joan of Arc_, which is almost wholly sad, a +study in pathos, while _The Gilded Age_ makes its readers weep and laugh +by turns. + +As in the expression so also in the source. When Lincoln with tender +emphasis said to me that Artemus Ward's humor was largely "the result of a +broken heart," he was but stating the law of nature that deep sorrow is as +essential to humor as winter snows are to the bloom of spring. Charles +Lamb's many griefs, and especially his sorrow over his insane sister, were +the black soil from which his genius grew. + +Many of Josh Billings's ludicrous sayings were misspelled through his +tears. The traceable outlines of tragedies in the early lives of writers +like Bret Harte, Mark Twain, Bob Burdette, and Nasby testify to the rule +that a sad night somewhere precedes the dawn of pure wit and inspiring +humor. + +Burton in his _Anatomy of Melancholy_ said, "If there is a hell on earth, +it is to be found in the melancholy man's heart." But James Whitcomb Riley +said that "wit in luxuriant growth is ever the product of soil richly +fertilized by sorrow." As for Lincoln, his first love died of a broken +heart; he lived on with one. + +"Cheer up, Abe! Cheer up!" was the hourly advice of the sympathetic +pioneers among whom he lived. But the sorrowing stranger was, after all, +friendless, and he could not cheer up alone. He was an orphan, homeless; +he had no sister, no brother, no wife to soothe, advise, or caress him. +The floods of sorrow had swallowed him up and he struggled alone. Few, +indeed, are the men or women who have descended so deep and endured to +remember it. + +Down into the darkness came faint voices saying over and over, "Cheer up, +Abe!" If he could muster the courage to do as they said, he would be saved +from death or the insane asylum, which is more dreaded than the grave. +Nothing but cheer could be of any use. + +One dear old saint told him to remember that his sweetheart's soul was not +dead, and that she, undoubtedly, wished him to complete his law studies +and to make himself a strong, good man. "For her sake, go on with life and +fill the years with good deeds!" + +Years afterward he must have thought of that when, in the dark days of +General McClelland's failures, he urged the soldiers to "cheer up and thus +become invincible." Mr. Lincoln, in 1863, when speaking of his regard for +the Bible, said that once he read the Bible half through carefully to find +a quotation which he saw first in a scrap of newspaper, which declared, +"A merry heart doeth good like a medicine." That must have been done in +those sad days when the darkness was still upon him. + +How little has the world yet appreciated the important maxim given to +those who seek success, "to smile and smile, and smile again." It is a +very practical and a very useful direction. But it may be a hypocritical +camouflage when it has no important reflex influence on the man himself. + +The same idea was expressed with serious emphasis by Lincoln in 1858, when +he urged the teachers of Keokuk, Iowa, to let the children laugh. He said +that a hearty, natural laugh would cure many ills of mankind, whether +those ills were physical, mental, or moral. The truth and usefulness of +that statement it has taken science and religion more than a half century +to accept. Now the study of good cheer is one of the major sciences. Some +psychologists contend that laughter is one of the greatest aids to +digestion and is highly conducive to health; therefore, Hufeland, +physician to the King of Prussia, commended the wisdom of the ancients, +who maintained a jester who was always present at their meals and whose +quips and cranks would keep the table in a roar. + +It was an important declaration made by the humorous "Bob" Burdette, when +he said that an old physician of Bellevue Hospital had assured him that a +cheerful priest who visited the hospital daily "had cured more patients by +his laughter than had any physician with his prescriptions." Burdette +rated himself, in his uses of fun, as the "oiler-up of human machinery"; +and good cheer and righteousness followed him closely, keeping ever within +the sound of his voice. The life-giving, invigorating spirit of good cheer +made Abraham Lincoln's great mind clearer and held him to his faith that +right makes might, and that night is but the vestibule of morning. + +If Lincoln was the founder, as many believe, of the "modern school of good +cheer," he was a mighty benefactor of the human race. The idea of healing +by suggestion, by hopeful influences, and by faith has given rise to many +societies, schools, churches, and healers, all having for their basic +principle the healthful stimulation of the weak body by the use of +faith--that is to say, cheer. Innumerable cases of the prevention of +insanity, and some cases of the complete restoration of hopeless lunatics, +by laughter and fresh confidence are now known to the medical profession. +One draught of deep, hearty laughter has been known to effect an immediate +cure of such nervous disorders, especially neuralgia, hysteria, and +insomnia. The doctor who smiles sincerely is two doctors in one. He heals +through the body and he heals through the mind. + +When this teaching is applied to the eradication of immorality or the +defeat of religious errors we are reminded of Lincoln's remark that "the +devil cannot bear a good joke." That martyr is not going to recant who, on +his way to the scaffold, can smile as he pats the head of a child. The +believer in the assertion that "all things work together for good to those +who love God" can laugh at difficulties, and he will be heard and followed +by a throng. Spurgeon said that "a good joke hurled at the devil and his +angels is like a bursting bomb of Greek fire." Ridicule with laughter the +hypocrite or evil schemer, and he will crouch at your feet or fly into +self-destructive passion; but ridicule Abraham Lincoln and he lifts his +clenched hand and smiles while he strikes. The cartoonist ever defeats the +orator. People dance only under the impulse of cheerful music. These +thoughts are recorded here because they were suggested by Abraham Lincoln +and because they furnish a very satisfactory reason why Lincoln laughed. + +The tales of Lincoln's droll stories and perpetual fun making before he +was twenty-four years old seem to have no trustworthy foundation. His use +of humor as a duty and as a weapon in debate first appears distinctly +about the year 1836, when he was admitted to the bar. He was almost +unnoticed in the legislature until he secured sufficient confidence to use +side-splitting jokes in the defeat of the opponents of righteousness. As +paradoxical as it first may seem, joking, with Lincoln, was a serious +matter. He had been saved by good cheer, and he was conscientiously +determined to save others by the use of that same potent force. + +It has been said that the humanizing effect of his homely humor was what +gave Lincoln a place in the hearts of mankind such as few others have ever +held. One man whom I knew intimately in my boyhood days was as devoted and +as high minded, probably, as anyone who ever lived. He had a great +influence upon the events of his day; some people regarded him as almost a +saint--or at least a prophet. Yet he never captured the heart of the +people as Abraham Lincoln did, and to-day he is virtually forgotten. That +man was John Brown. + +When I had my long interview with President Lincoln in the winter of 1864 +I told him that John Brown had been for a number of years in partnership +with my father in the wool business at Springfield, Massachusetts, and +that he was a frequent and intimate caller at our house. He and my father +were closely associated in the antislavery movement and in the operation +of the "underground railway" by which fugitive blacks were spirited across +the line into Canada. The idea of a slave uprising in Virginia was +discussed at our dinner table again and again for years before the +Harper's Ferry raid finally took place; and it is altogether probable that +my father would have shared Brown's martyrdom if my mother's persistent +opposition had not defeated his natural inclination. + +John Brown had a summer place in the Adirondacks, and when he left there +a man remained behind in the old cabin to help the slaves escape. This was +not the route usually followed, however. Most of the fugitives came up +from Virginia to Philadelphia, from Philadelphia to New York, New York to +Hartford, and thence over the line into Canada. My father's branch of the +"underground railway" ran from Springfield to Bellows Falls. It was a +common thing for our woodshed to be filled with negroes whom my father +would guide at the first opportunity to the next "station." This was very +risky work; its alarms darkened my boyhood and filled our days with fears. + +Lincoln was very much interested that day in what I told him about John +Brown. He asked me many questions, but I soon saw that there was very +little he did not know about the subject. Finally I told him that while my +father shared John Brown's opinions, my mother thought he was a kind of +monomaniac and frequently said so. At this Lincoln laughed heartily, but +he made no verbal comment. + +Nobody could be more earnest or sincere than Lincoln, but he could laugh; +John Brown could not. My earliest impression, as a little boy, of John +Brown, was that he might be one of the old prophets; he made me think of +Isaiah. He was tall and thin; he wore a long beard and was always very, +very serious. He hardly ever told a joke. John Brown's part in the +business partnership was to sell the wool which my father bought from the +farmers in the surrounding territory. So Brown was the man in the office, +with time and opportunity for study and planning, while my father was out +in the open, dealing with other men. Until they became involved so deeply +in the antislavery movement the wool business prospered; the fact was that +my father trusted Brown's business judgment as being pretty good. But in +the end they gave up everything in the way of business of any sort. My +father was a Methodist, but I do not remember hearing that John Brown +belonged to any church. The liberation of the slaves obsessed his mind to +the exclusion of all other thoughts and interests. + +Brown used to drive over to our house two or three times a week. It was a +thirty-mile drive from Springfield, so he had always to spend the night. + +I have kept the latch of the door to his room--the room which he always +occupied. How many times he raised that latch in passing in and out! + +I was a little chap then and used often to sit on his knee and listen to +his stories told in that solemn, deep voice, which lent a mysterious +dignity to the most unimportant tale. + +When evening came and dinner was over and the womenfolk were busy outside, +Brown and my father would pull up their chairs to the dining table, on +which a big lamp had been set, and talk long and earnestly--sometimes far +into the night--while they pored over maps and lists and memoranda. Often +I would wake up, when it seemed that morning must be almost at hand, and +hear John Brown's low, even-toned voice speaking words which were to me +without meaning. + +Next morning, after an early breakfast, he would harness his horse to the +buggy, if one of us boys had not already done it for him, and start on the +lonely drive back to Springfield. + +Brown and my father had accurate knowledge of many facts which might +contribute to the success of a slave uprising in Virginia. They knew how +many plantations there were and how many negroes were owned in each +county--also the number of whites. Brown knew the names of the owners of +the plantations and the means of reaching the plantations by unfrequented +ways. He had talked this over with my father for years. William Lloyd +Garrison told him it was a very foolish enterprise that he contemplated, +and was opposed to it, although he was Brown's intimate friend. + +It is a significant and a not generally known fact that John Brown +actually believed his insurrection would succeed; but whether it would or +not, he was determined sooner or later to make the attempt. He said, "If I +die that way, I will do more good than by living on; and, anyhow, I will +do it whether it succeeds or not." + +The last time I saw John Brown was when he drove out to our house before +leaving Springfield to go to Harper's Ferry. My father drove him down to +the station--to Huntingdon railroad station; they called it Chester +Village then, but the name has since been changed. The last letter that he +wrote from the prison at Charleston was to my father. It was written the +day before his execution. + +John Brown's character was perfectly suited to the part he elected to +play, and that this had a potent influence upon people's minds and +through them upon events leading up to the war cannot be denied. A less +austere man or a man less firm in his own convictions would never have +carried through such a mad exploit. But it is not a desecration of John +Brown's memory to state the simple fact that he lacked the quality of +human understanding which Lincoln possessed so richly and which showed +itself in the smile of sympathy and the word of good cheer. + + * * * * * + +Before I left Washington to go back to my regiment I learned that the +friend for whose life I had gone to plead had been pardoned by the +President. The hearty greeting which hailed the return of that young +soldier to his comrades was full of spontaneous joy, but in the background +of the picture was the great form of Old Abe, the greatest saint in the +calendar of all the soldiers. + +He was indeed, as has been often said before, the best friend of the whole +country--the South as well as the North. Through all of that bitter +struggle he never forgot that he had been elected President of _all_ the +United States. + +When I had a second long talk with Lincoln, just shortly before he was +murdered, not one word did he say against the South or against the +generals of the South. He spoke of General Lee always in respectful terms. +He respected the Southern army and the Southern people, and he estimated +them for just about what they were worth. He did not underestimate their +power nor their patriotism; not a word in that two hours' interview did he +say against the Southern army or the Southern people vindictively; it was +that of a calm statesman who estimated them for what they were worth; and +whenever he mentioned the name of General Lee he emphasized the fact that +Lee was fighting that war on a high principle, not one of vindictiveness +or any small ambition. + +He realized that the Southern people were fighting for what they believed +was right, and he knew General Lee would not be in it unless he was +convinced it was right. He did not say that in words, but that is the +impression I received. To hear the stories of Southern barbarities which +would naturally be circulated about the enemy and then to find the +President of the United States treating the matter with such dignity and +calmness was a surprise and an enlightenment to me. + +On that black day when the body of Abraham Lincoln lay in state in the +East Room of the White House it was my great privilege to be detailed for +duty there. I happened to be in Washington, recovering from a wound +sustained in the battle of Kenesaw Mountain a short time before, and I was +called upon, together with all unattached officers in the Capitol, to help +out. About twenty officers were continually on duty in the room in which +the casket stood. Two of us actually stood guard at a time--one at the +head and one at the foot. The casket was heaped high with flowers and the +people passed through the room in an unending stream. + +No such grief was ever known on this continent. All wept, strong, hardened +warriors with the rest. People were heartily ashamed when their supply of +tears ran out. Some trembled as they passed through the door, and, once +outside the room, gave vent to their sorrow in groans and shrieks, while +others, in the excess of their grief, cursed God, as though Lincoln's +death was an unjust punishment of him instead of a glorious crown of +martyrdom. + +Looking back through fifty-four years--after the calm judgment of sages +has reasserted their wisdom and after all Lincoln's enemies have turned to +devoted friends--we cannot forbear the renewed assertion that Abraham +Lincoln was in some special way unlike other men. That unusual power of +inspiration was exhibited in his words and acts almost every day of his +closing years. + +Through the half century there comes down to us a wonderful sentence in +Lincoln's second inaugural address which is incarnate with vigorous life. +Out of the smoke, devastation, hate, and death of a gigantic fratricidal +war, above the contentions of parties, jealous commanders, and +grief-benumbed mourners, clear and certain as a trumpet call this +unlooked-for declaration rang out. It was the voice of God: + + With malice toward none, with charity for all, with firmness in the + right as God gives us to see the right, let us strive on to finish the + work we are in, to bind up the Nation's wounds, to care for him who + shall have borne the battle and for his widow and his orphans, to do + all which may achieve and cherish a just and lasting peace among + ourselves and with all nations. + +What a Christian spirit, what a deference to God, what a determined +purpose for good! What a basis for peace among the nations was there +stated in one single sentence! Where in the writings of the gifted +geniuses, ancient or modern, is another one so potent. Yet the mere dead +words are not specially symmetrical, and the expression is in the language +of the common people. The influence is that of the spirit; it can never +die. + +His enemies mourned when he died and all the world said a great soul had +departed. But the children of his dear heart and brain will live on the +earth forever. They will pray and teach and sacrifice and fight on until +all nations shall be the one human family which the prophet Lincoln so +clearly foresaw. Men are called to special work. Men are more divine than +material; and among the most trustworthy proofs of this intuitive truth is +the continuing force of the personality of Abraham Lincoln. + + + +***END OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK WHY LINCOLN LAUGHED*** + + +******* This file should be named 38423-8.txt or 38423-8.zip ******* + + +This and all associated files of various formats will be found in: +http://www.gutenberg.org/dirs/3/8/4/2/38423 + + + +Updated editions will replace the previous one--the old editions +will be renamed. + +Creating the works from public domain print editions means that no +one owns a United States copyright in these works, so the Foundation +(and you!) can copy and distribute it in the United States without +permission and without paying copyright royalties. Special rules, +set forth in the General Terms of Use part of this license, apply to +copying and distributing Project Gutenberg-tm electronic works to +protect the PROJECT GUTENBERG-tm concept and trademark. 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