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“It Won’t Do to Put that Young Man in the Cabinet”
The day after his nomination, Mr. Ashman, president of the Convention, with a large party of distinguished gentlemen, members of the Convention, arrived in Springfield to inform Mr. Lincoln of his nomination, and to receive his reply.
Mr. Lincoln had requested me to escort this party to his house. Mr. Ashman’s address, and Mr. Lincoln’s reply are matters of history. The aptness of Mr. Lincoln’s words, and the unstudied dignity of his manner, in that trying moment, in the little crowded parlor, surprised and delighted his guests, few of whom had ever seen him before. As he sat down, Mr. Boutwell, afterwards Secretary of the Treasury, and Senator from Massachusetts, whispered to me: ” They told me he was a rough diamond I protest against the adjective nothing could have been more elegant and appropriate.”Soon after, little Tad worked his way up to his father’s side, and whispered very loud in his ear. Mr. Lincoln knew that nearly everyone in the room must have heard the whisper but not the least disconcerted, he arose, and laughing, said: “You see, gentlemen, that if I am elected, it won’t do to put that young man in the cabinet — he can’t be intrusted with state secrets.” The ready wit of this pleasantry was immensely enjoyed. After the merriment had subsided, Mr. Lincoln, still standing, remarked: “And now, gentlemen, as you are already aware, Mrs. Lincoln will be happy to meet you in the diningroom” and led the way to as pleasant and merry a tea party as eyer gathered in that little house on Eighth street.
Quoted in “Abraham Lincoln; an address”,by Newton Bateman, LL. D. (Galesbvrg, Ill., The Cadmvs clvb, 1899),P28
He’s Just Beautiful.
Lincoln’s great love for children easily won their confidence. A little girl, who had been told that the President was very homely, was taken by her father to see the President at the White House. Lincoln took her upon his knee and chatted with her for a moment in his merry way, when she turned to her father and exclaimed: “Oh, Pa! he isn’t ugly at all; he’s just beautiful!”
Lincoln’s Yarns and Stories by Colonel Alexander K. McClure , From Wit & Humor Of Abraham Lincoln, Gathered from Authentic Sources by Carleton B., Case, Chicago: Shrewesbury Publishing Co., 1916; pp. 50-99.
A little incident, showing how truly his noble nature was interpreted by the intuitions of children, may here be mentioned: A little girl who had heard Mr. Lincoln spoken of as “ugly” was taken by her father to see him. Whereupon she exclaimed, “Why, Pa, he’s not ugly at all, he’s beautiful.”
Abraham Lincoln： An Address By Newton Bateman
Sandburg-397, 267
“The Striking Thing about him was his Affection for the Child.”
I noticed his sweetness of nature particularly with his little son, a child at that time perhaps seven or nine years old, who used to roam the departments, and whom everybody called Tad. He had a defective palate, and couldn’t speak very plainly. Often I have sat by his father, reporting to him about some important matter that I had been ordered to inquire into, and he would have this boy on his knee; and, while he would perfectly understand the report, the striking thing about him was his affection for the child.
He was good to everybody. Once there was a great gathering at the White House on New Year’s day, and all the diplomats came in their uniforms, and all the officers of the army and navy in Washington were in full costume. A little girl of mine said, Papa, couldn’t you take me over to see that? I said yes; so I took her over and put her in a corner, where she beheld this gorgeous show. When it was finished, I went up to Mr. Lincoln, and said, I have a little girl here who wants to shake hands with you. He went over to her, and took her up and kissed her and talked to her. She will never forget it if she lives to be a thousand years old. That was the nature of the man. I must tell another story to illustrate the same point.
By Charles A. Dana, Recollections of the Civil War. Sandburg-397, 267
“He Was Constantly Out With The Common People”
Some persons may insist that this picture is too highly colored. If so, I can only answer, they do not know the facts. The majority of those who have a personal knowledge of them are persistent in their silence. If their lips could be opened and all could be known, my conclusions and statements, to say the least of them, would be found to be fair, reasonable, and true. A few words more as to Lincoln’s domestic history, and I pass to a different phase of his life. One of his warmest and closest friends, who still survives, maintains the theory that, after all, Lincoln’s political ascendancy and final elevation to the Presidency were due more to the influence of his wife than to any other person or cause. “The fact,” insists this friend, “that Mary Todd, by her turbulent nature and unfortunate manner, prevented her husband from becoming a domestic man, operated largely in his favor; for he was thereby kept out in the world of business and politics. Instead of spending his evenings at home, reading the papers and warming his toes at his own fireside, he was constantly out with the common people, was mingling with the politicians, discussing public questions with the farmers who thronged the offices in the court-house and state house, and exchanging views with the loungers who surrounded the stove of winter evenings in the village store. The result of this continuous contact with the world was, that he was more thoroughly known than any other man in his community. His wife, therefore, was one of the unintentional means of his promotion. If, on the other hand, he had married some less ambitious but more domestic woman, some honest farmer’s quiet daughter,-one who would have looked up to and worshipped him because he uplifted her,-the result might have been different. For, although it doubtless would have been her pride to see that he had clean clothes whenever he needed them; that his slippers were always in their place; that he was warmly clad and had plenty to eat; and, although the privilege of ministering to his every wish and whim might have been to her a pleasure rather than a duty; yet I fear he would have been buried in the pleasures of a loving home, and the country would never have had Abraham Lincoln for its President.”
By William H. Herndon，Jesse W. Weik “Herndon’s Lincoln: A True Story of a Great Life” Herndon-257-15
“What did Mrs. Lincoln Say?”
In dealing with Mr. Lincoln’s home life perhaps I am revealing an element of his character that has heretofore been kept from the world; but in doing so I feel sure I am treading on no person’s toes, for all the actors in this domestic drama are dead, and the world seems ready to hear the facts. As his married life, in the opinion of all his friends, exerted a peculiar influence over Mr. Lincoln’s political career there can be no impropriety, I apprehend, in throwing the light on it now. Mrs. Lincoln’s disposition and nature have been dwelt upon in another chapter, and enough has been told to show that one of her greatest misfortunes was her inability to control her temper. Admit that, and everything can be explained. However cold and abstracted her husband may have appeared to others, however impressive, when aroused, may have seemed his indignation in public, he never gave vent to his feelings at home. He always meekly accepted as final the authority of his wife in all matters of domestic concern.
One day a man making some improvements in Lincoln’s yard suggested to Mrs. Lincoln the propriety of cutting down one of the trees, to which she willingly assented. Before doing so, however, the man came down to our office and consulted Lincoln himself about it. “What did Mrs. Lincoln say?” enquired the latter. “She consented to have it taken away.” “Then, in God’s name,” exclaimed Lincoln, “cut it down to the roots!”
By William H. Herndon，Jesse W. Weik “Herndon’s Lincoln: A True Story of a Great Life” Herndon-257-04
“Keep up your Courage”
Mrs. Lincoln, on account of her peculiar nature, could not long retain a servant in her employ. The sea was never so placid but that a breeze would ruffle its waters. She loved show and attention, and if, when she glorified her family descent or indulged in one of her strange outbreaks, the servant could simulate absolute obsequiousness or had tact enough to encourage her social pretensions, Mrs. Lincoln was for the time her firmest friend. One servant, who adjusted herself to suit the lady’s capricious ways, lived with the family for several years. She told me that at the time of the debate between Douglas and Lincoln she often heard the latter’s wife boast that she would yet be mistress of the White House. The secret of her ability to endure the eccentricities of her mistress came out in the admission that Mr. Lincoln gave her an extra dollar each week on condition that she would brave whatever storms might arise, and suffer whatever might befall her, without complaint. It was a rather severe condition, but she lived rigidly up to her part of the contract. The money was paid secretly and without the knowledge of Mrs. Lincoln. Frequently, after tempestuous scenes between the mistress and her servant, Lincoln at the first opportunity would place his hand encouragingly on the latter’s shoulder with the admonition, “Mary, keep up your courage.” It may not be without interest to add that the servant afterwards married a man who enlisted in the army. In the spring of 1865 his wife managed to reach Washington to secure her husband’s release from the service. After some effort she succeeded in obtaining an interview with the President. He was glad to see her, gave her a basket of fruit, and directed her to call the next day and obtain a pass through the lines and money to buy clothes for herself and children. That night he was assassinated.
By William H. Herndon，Jesse W. Weik “Herndon’s Lincoln: A True Story of a Great Life” Herndon-257-09
“I have had as my Daily Portion”
A man once called at the house to learn why Mrs. Lincoln had so unceremoniously discharged his niece from her employ. Mrs. Lincoln met him at the door, and being somewhat wrought up, gave vent to her feelings, resorting to such violent gestures and emphatic language that the man was glad to beat a hasty retreat. He at once started out to find Lincoln, determined to exact from him proper satisfaction for his wife’s action. Lincoln was entertaining a crowd in a store at the time. The man, still laboring under some agitation, called him to the door and made the demand. Lincoln listened for a moment to his story. “My friend,” he interrupted, “I regret to hear this, but let me ask you in all candor, can’t you endure for a few moments what I have had as my daily portion for the last fifteen years?” These words were spoken so mournfully and with such a look of distress that the man was completely disarmed. It was a case that appealed to his feelings. Grasping the unfortunate husband’s hand, he expressed in no uncertain terms his sympathy, and even apologized for having approached him. He said no more about the infuriated wife, and Lincoln afterward had no better friend in Springfield.
By William H. Herndon，Jesse W. Weik “Herndon’s Lincoln: A True Story of a Great Life” Herndon-257-12
“A Breeze Had Sprung Up Over The Domestic Sea”
He was not exactly an early riser, that is, he never usually appeared at the office till about nine o’clock in the morning. I usually preceded him an hour. Sometimes, however, he would come down as early as seven o’clock-in fact, on one occasion I remember he came down before daylight. If, on arriving at the office, I found him in, I knew instantly that a breeze had sprung up over the domestic sea, and that the waters were troubled. He would either be lying on the lounge looking skyward, or doubled up in a chair with his feet resting on the sill of a back window. He would not look up on my entering, and only answered my “Good morning” with a grunt. I at once busied myself with pen and paper, or ran through the leaves of some book; but the evidence of his melancholy and distress was so plain, and his silence so significant, that I would grow restless myself, and finding some excuse to go to the courthouse or elsewhere, would leave the room.
The door of the office opening into a narrow hallway was half glass, with a curtain on it working on brass rings strung on wire. As I passed out on these occasions I would draw the curtain across the glass, and before I reached the bottom of the stairs I could hear the key turn in the lock, and Lincoln was alone in his gloom. An hour in the clerk’s office at the court-house, an hour longer in a neighboring store having passed, I would return. By that time either a client had dropped in and Lincoln was propounding the law, or else the cloud of despondency had passed away, and he was busy in the recital of an Indiana story to whistle off the recollections of the morning’s gloom. Noon having arrived I would depart homeward for my dinner. Returning within an hour, I would find him still in the office,-although his house stood but a few squares away,-lunching on a slice of cheese and a handful of crackers which, in my absence, he had brought up from a store below. Separating for the day at five or six o’clock in the evening, I would still leave him behind, either sitting on a box at the foot of the stairway, entertaining a few loungers, or killing time in the same way on the court-house steps. A light in the office after dark attested his presence there till late along in the night, when, after all the world had gone to sleep, the tall form of the man destined to be the nation’s President could have been seen strolling along in the shadows of trees and buildings, and quietly slipping in through the door of a modest frame house, which it pleased the world, in a conventional way, to call his home.
By William H. Herndon，Jesse W. Weik “Herndon’s Lincoln: A True Story of a Great Life” Herndon-257-14
“As the Father Imparted his Advice”
GOOD FRIDAY, APRIL 14, 1865, was surely one of Lincoln’s happiest days. The morning began with a leisurely breakfast in the company of his son Robert, just arrived in Washington. “Well, my son, you have returned safely from the front,” Lincoln said. “The war is now closed, and we soon will live in peace with the brave men that have been fighting against us.” He urged Robert to “lay aside” his army uniform and finish his education, perhaps in preparation for a law career. As the father imparted his advice, Elizabeth Keckley observed, “his face was more cheerful than [she] had seen it for a long while.”
“Well, my son…for a long while”: Keckley, Behind the Scenes, pp. 137-38. By Doris Kearns Goodwin，“Team of Rivals: The Political Genius of Abraham Lincoln”，Goodwin-731-499-01
“The Boys Literally Crawled All Over Him”
After dinner he sometimes stared into the fireplace for half an hour at a time, saying nothing. The boys literally crawled all over him and pulled his hair and talked to him, but he seemed unconscious of their existence. Then suddenly he would come to and tell a joke or recite one of his favorite verses: “Oh, why should the spirit of mortal be proud? Like a swift-fleeting meteor, a fast-flying cloud, A flash of the lightning, a break of the wave, He passes from life to his rest in the grave.”
Mrs. Lincoln criticized him for never correcting the children. But he so adored them that “he was blind and deaf to their faults.” “He never neglected to praise them for any of their good acts,” said Mrs. Lincoln, “and declared: Tt is my pleasure that my children are free and happy, and unrestrained by parental tyranny. Love is the chain whereby to bind a child to its parents.’ ”
By Dale Carnegie，“Lincoln, the Unknown” ，Carnegie-070-13