Vermont watchman and State journal. [volume] (Montpelier, Vt.) 1836-1883, 1883-01-24
ShOp.keeping In the White House.

Mingled with his boyish simplicity, Tad
Lincoln had a great deal of native shrewd-
ness. The White House was infested with
a numerous horde of ofiice-seekers. From
day to day these men crowded the corridors
leading to the presidents office. Some
times they were so numerous as to line the
halls all the way down the stairs. 1t was
not long before Tad found out what this
assemblage meant, and it then became one
of his greatest diversions, when other re-
sources failed, to 60 around among the Office
seekers and alphabetically inquire what
they wanted, how long they had waited, and
how much longer they proposed to wait.
To some he gave good advice telling them
to go home and chop wood for living.
Others he tried to dismiss by volunteering
to speak to his father in their behalf, if
they would promise not to come again.
Many of these people were at the White
House for weeks and even months, never
missing day, unless they learned that the
president was out of town, or otherwise alb
sent from the house.
Tad levied tribute on the men whose
faces he had learned to know. Once he
mounted guard at the foot OF the staircase
and compelled every passenger to pay an
admission fee of five CENTS for the benft
of the sanitary fund.-" as he explained.
Most of the visitors took it in good part,
and some of the fawning creatures, glad of
an opportunity to earn the goodwill of the
little fellow, paid their way with a stamp"
of some considerable value. This venture
was so successful that Tad resolved on hav-
ing one OF the sanitary commission fairs
then 80 much in vogue all over the country.
He placed table in the grand corridor, or
entrance hall, of the White House, stocked
it with few broken toys, some purchases
of fruit, sundry articles of food begged
from the family pantry, and lot of misce-
laneous odds and ends contributed by ad-
miring friends. Before night, the sanitary
fair of the White House was closed out No
man who looked as if he had money in his
pocket was permitted to pass into the house
that day without first buying something of
Master Lincoln's stock in trade.
His success in this venture emboldened
him soon afterward to branch out in a
larger speculation. Having saved up quite
a sum of pocket money, he bought out the
entire stock of an old woman who sold APP
Piles and gingerbread near the treasury
building. pair of trestes and board,
extorted from the carpenters employed on
the building, gave the young merchant his
counter, and he set up his shop in the grand,
historic portico of the White House much
TO the horror of some of the eminently re-
spectacle people who passed by and beheld
this most undignified proceeding. Before
noon, almost every oiiice-seeker who entered
had bought luncheon, under compulsion,
from the alert little shop-keeper, who drove
brisk trade as long as his goods lasted
When Tad had sold out all he had to sell,
a goodly lot of fractional currency of those
times was stuffed into his pockets, his
hat and his little fist. He was "the
presidents son." and that was enough
for the flatterers, who were glad TO buy of
him. But Tad was too generous and too
open-handed to be long gamer by any such
operations. Before night, capital and pro-
fits had been squandered, and the little spec
ulstor went penniless TO bed.-St. Nicholas
for November,