LINCOLN (Vol. 1-7). Theodore Roosevelt
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interspersed, illustrated, and seasoned pleasantly with Mr. Lincoln's stories, anecdotes, etc. And here I feel called upon to vindicate Mr. Lincoln, as far as my opportunities and observation go, from the frequent imputation of telling indelicate and ribald stories. I saw much of him during his whole Presidential term, with familiar friends and alone, when he talked without restraint; but I never heard him use a profane or indecent word, or tell a story that might not be repeated in the presence of ladies."
"Mr. Lincoln observed," continues Mr. Weed, "that the making of a Cabinet, now that he had it to do, was by no means as easy as he had supposed; that he had, even before the result of the election was known, assuming the probability of success, fixed upon the two leading members of his Cabinet, but that in looking about for suitable men to fill the other departments he had been much embarrassed, partly from his want of acquaintance with the prominent men of the day, and partly because he believed that while the population of the country had immensely increased really great men were scarcer than they used to be.... As the conversation progressed, Lincoln remarked that he intended to invite Governor Seward to take the State Department and Governor Chase the Treasury Department, remarking that aside from their long experience in public affairs and their eminent fitness they were prominently before the people and the convention as competitors for the Presidency, each having higher claims than his own for the place which he was to occupy. On naming Hon. Gideon Welles as the man he thought of as the representative of New England in the Cabinet, I remarked that I thought he could find several New England gentlemen whose selection for a place in his Cabinet would be more acceptable to the people of New England. 'But,' said Mr. Lincoln, 'we must remember that the Republican party is constituted of two elements, and that we must have men of Democratic as well as of Whig antecedents in the Cabinet.' ... In the course of our conversations Mr. Lincoln remarked that it was particularly pleasant to him to reflect that he was coming into office unembarrassed by promises. He owed, he supposed, his exemption from importunities to the circumstance that his name as a candidate was but a short time before the people, and that only a few sanguine friends anticipated the possibility of his nomination. 'I have not,' said he, 'promised an office to any man, nor have I, but in a single instance, mentally committed myself to an appointment.'"
"In this way two days passed very pleasantly," says Mr. Weed, "the conversation being alternately earnest and playful. I wish it were possible to give, in Mr. Lincoln's amusing but quaint manner, the many stories, anecdotes, and witticisms with which he interlarded and enlivened what with almost any of his predecessors in the high office of President would have been a grave, dry consultation. The great merit of Mr. Lincoln's stories, like Captain Bunsby's opinion, 'lays in the application on it.' They always and exactly suited the occasion and the object, and none to which I ever listened seemed far-fetched or pointless. I will attempt to repeat one of them. If I have an especial fondness for any particular luxury, it manifests itself in a remarkable way when properly made December sausages are placed before me. While at breakfast, Judge Davis, noticing that, after having been bountifully served with sausage, like Oliver Twist I wanted some more, said, 'You seem fond of our Illinois sausages.' To which I responded affirmatively, adding that I thought the article might be relied on where pork was cheaper than dogs. 'That,' said Mr. Lincoln, 'reminds me of what occurred down at Joliet, where a popular grocer supplied all the villagers with sausages. One Saturday evening, when his grocery was filled with customers for whom he and his boys were busily engaged in weighing sausages, a neighbor with whom he had had a violent quarrel that day, came into the grocery and made his way up to the counter holding by the tail two enormous dead cats which he deliberately threw on to the counter, saying, 'This makes seven to-day. I'll call around Monday and get my money for them.'"
During the months intervening between his election and his departure for Washington, Lincoln maintained a keen though quiet watchfulness of the threatening aspect of affairs at the national capital and throughout the South. He was careful not to commit himself by needless utterances as to his future policy; but in all his demeanor, as a friend said, he displayed the firmness and determination, without the temper, of Jackson. In December following his election he wrote the following letters to his intimate friend, Hon. E.B. Washburne, then a member of Congress from Illinois:
SPRINGFIELD, ILL.,
Dec. 13, 1860.
HON. E.B. WASHBURNE—My Dear Sir: Your long letter received. Prevent, as far as possible, any of our friends from demoralizing themselves and our cause by entertaining propositions for compromise of any sort on the slavery extension. There is no possible compromise upon it but which puts us under again, and leaves us all our work to do over again. Whether it be a Missouri line, or Eli Thayer's Popular Sovereignty, it is all the same. Let either be done, and immediately filibustering and extending slavery recommences. On that point hold firm, as with a chain of steel.
Yours as ever,
A. LINCOLN.
SPRINGFIELD, ILL.,
Dec. 21, 1860.
HON. E.B. WASHBURNE—My Dear Sir: Last night I received your letter giving an account of your interview with General Scott, and for which I thank you. Please present my respects to the General, and tell him confidentially that I shall be obliged to him to be as well prepared as he can to either hold or retake the forts, as the case may require, at and after the inauguration.
Yours as ever,
A. LINCOLN.
The Southern States, led on by South Carolina, which formally severed its connection with the Union November 17, 1860 (only eleven days after Lincoln's election), were preparing to dissolve their alliance with the Free States. Mississippi passed the ordinance of secession January 9, 1861; Florida followed on the 10th; Alabama on the 11th; Georgia on the 19th; Louisiana on the 25th; and Texas on the 1st day of February. The plans of the seceders went on, unmolested by the Buchanan administration. Southerners in the Cabinet and in Congress conspired to deplete the resources of the Government, leaving it helpless to contest the assumptions of the revolted States. The treasury was deliberately bankrupted; the ships of the navy were banished to distant ports; the Northern arsenals were rifled to furnish arms for the seceded States; the United States forts and armaments on the Southern coast were delivered into the hands of the enemy, with the exception of Fort Sumter, which was gallantly held by Major Robert Anderson. While this system of bold and unscrupulous treachery was carried on by men in the highest places of trust, the chief executive of the nation remained a passive spectator. The South was in open rebellion, and the North was powerless to interfere. The weeks prior to the inauguration of the new administration dragged slowly along, each day adding fresh cause for anxiety and alarm.
Amidst these portentous scenes Lincoln, watching them from a distance, maintained his calm and vigilant attitude. No one knew better than he the significance of these ominous events that were taking place at the nation's capital and in the disaffected States; but there was nothing he could do about them. His time for action had not yet come. He said little, but enough to show unmistakably what he thought of the situation and what course he had resolved upon to meet it. As early as December 17, 1860—a little more than a month after his election—in writing to Thurlow Weed, he said: "My opinion is that no State can in any way get out of the Union without the consent of the other States; and that it is the duty of the President to run the machine as it is." He had been made the pilot of the ship of State, and his duty and purpose were to save the vessel.2 Upon this mighty task were concentrated all the powers of his intellect and will; and through all the desperate voyage that followed he never wavered or faltered in his course, from the time of his supreme resolve, made in the quiet of his country home, to the hour when
"From fearful trip the victor ship came in with object won"—
but with her more than heroic but now victorious Captain "fallen cold and dead" upon her deck.
As the winter wore away, and the time for Lincoln's inauguration as President drew near, he began making preparation for leaving the familiar scenes where his life had thus far been spent. Early in February he made a parting visit to his relatives in Coles County, to whom in this hour of grave trial and anxiety his heart turned with fresh yearning. He spent a night at Charleston, where his cousin Dennis Hanks, and Mrs. Colonel Chapman, a daughter of Dennis, resided. We