The contrast between the statures of the Lincolns, man and wife, was
palpable, but this hardly substantiates the story of the President
appearing with his wife on the White House porch in response to a
serenade, and his saying:
"Here I am, and here is Mrs. Lincoln. That's the long and short of it!"
* * * * *
"ALL A MAN WANTS--TWENTY THOUSAND DOLLARS!"
In one of his messages to Congress, the President foretold and
denounced the tendency of wealth acquired in masses and rapidly by the
war contractors and the like as "approaching despotism." He saw liberty
attacked in "the effort to place capital on an equal footing with--if
not above--labor in the structure of government." It is never to be
forgotten that neither he nor his Cabinet officers were ever upbraided
for corruption; [Footnote: It is true that Lincoln's first war
minister, Simon Cameron, was accused of smoothing the way to certain
fat war contracts, a wit suggesting Simony as the term, but no charges
were really brought. Lincoln said that if one proof were forthcoming,
he would have the Cameronian head--but Mr. Cameron died intact.] some,
like Secretary Stanton, though handling enormous sums, died poor men
comparatively. It is in accordance with this honesty of the "Honest Old
Abe" rule that he said to an old friend whom he met in New York in 1859:
"How have you fared since you left us?"
The merchant gleefully replied that he had made a hundred thousand
dollars in business. "And--lost it all!" with a reflection of Lincoln's
and the Western cool humor. "How is it on your part?"
"Oh, very well; I have the cottage at Springfield, and about eight
hundred dollars. If they make me vice-president with Seward, as some
say they will, I hope I shall be able to increase it to twenty
thousand. That is as much as any man ought to want!"
* * * * *
"I'LL HIT THE THING HARD!"
In Coffin's "Lincoln," it is stated that when Lincoln and Offutt,
boating to New Orleans, attended a slave auction for the first time,
the former said to his companion:
"By the Eternal, if ever I get a chance to hit this thing, I'll hit it
hard!"
The oath was General-President Jackson's, and familiar as a household
word at the day. The promise is premature in a youth of twenty.
Herndon, twenty-five years associated with Lincoln, doubts, but says
that Lincoln did allude to some such utterance. But it is Dennis Hanks,
cousin of Lincoln, who affirms that they two saw such a sight, and that
he knew by his companion's emotion that "the iron had entered into his
soul."
In 1841 Lincoln and Speed had a tedious low-water trip from Louisville
to St. Louis. Lincoln says: "There were on board ten or a dozen slaves
shackled together with irons. That sight was a continual torment to me
... a _thing_ which has and continually exercises the power of making
me miserable."
But his acts show that he "hit the thing hard." It could not recover
from the telling stroke which rent the black oak--the Emancipation Act.
* * * * *