“He Played on a Boy’s Harp all the Way”
Next day he made some arrangement about his horse and buggy, and took the train to fill an appointment somewhere up north-west. I saw him start for the train: being obliged to ride over two miles in an old dilapidated omnibus, he was the sole occupant of the nondescript conveyance he had somehow procured, and had in his hand a small french harp, which he was making most execrable music with. I rallied him on this, to which, stopping his concert, he replied, “This is my band; Douglas had a brass band with him in Peoria, but this will dome:” and he resumed his uncouth solo as the vehicle drove off: and the primitive strains, somewhat shaken up by the jolting conveyance, floated out upon the air till distance intervened.l
Quoted in Henry Clay Whitney, Life on the Circuit with Lincoln, introduction and notes by Paul M. Angle (Caldwell, Idaho: The Caxon Printers, 1940), pp.31
April 23, 2020 at 21:24
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