Belmont chronicle. [volume] (St. Clairsville, Ohio) 1855-1973, 1885-10-08
HOW Lincoln stopped CRITICISMS.

Gen. Porter contributes an interesting
paper on Lincoln and Grant" to The
Century for October, from which we
quote the following characteristic snec"
dote: Grants successes brought with
him the usual number of jealOusies and
rivalries. Political generals had their
advocates in Washington to plead their
cause, while Grant stood without friends
at court His detractors gathered at
times great deal of strength in their
efforts to supplant him with a general
of their own choosing, and Lincoln was
beset by many delegation who insist
ed that nothing would harmonic mat
ters in the West but Grants removal.
This nagging continued even after his
great trinmph at Vicksburg.
Lincoln always enjoyed telling the
General, after the two had become per-
sonally intimate. how the crossroads
wiseacres had criticised his campaigns.
One day, after dwelling for some time
on this subject, he said to Grant: AT
ter Vicksburg 1 thought it was about
time to shut down on this sort of thing.
So one day, when delegation came to
see me and had spent half an hour try
ing to show me the fatal mistake you
made in paroling Pemberton's army, and
insisting that the rebels would violate
their paroles and in less than month
confront you again in the ranks, and
have to be whipped all over again, 1
thodght should get rid of them best by
telling them a story about Sykes's dog.
"'Have you ever heard about Sykes's
yellow dog?" said to the spokesman of
the delegation. He said he hadn't.
-Well, must tell you about him." said
l. sykes had a yellow dog he set great
store by, but there were lot of small
boys around the village, and that's al
ways bad thing for dogs, you know.
These boys didn't share Sykess views.
and they were not disposed to let the
dog have a fair show. Even Sykes
had to admit that the dog was getting
unpopular; in fact it was soon seen that
a prejudice was growing up against that
dog that threatened to wreck all his fu-
ture prospects in life. The boys, after
meditating how they could get the best
of him, finally fixed up cartridge with
a fuse, put the cartridge in piece of
meat, dropped the meat in the road in
front of Sykes's door. and then perched
themselves on fence good distance
off with the end of the fuse in their
hands. Then they whistled for the dog.
When he came out he scented the bait, |
and bolted the meat, cartridge and all. |
The boys touched off the fuse with ci-
gar, and in about a second a report came
from that dog that sounded like small
clap of thunder. Sykes came bounding
out Of the house, and yelled:
"'" What's up? Anything busted?'
There was no reply except a snick>
er from the small boys roosting on the
fence, but as Sykes looked up he saw the
whole air filled with pieces of yellow
dog. He picked up the biggest piece be
could find, portion of the back with a
part of the tail still hanging to it, and
after turning it around and looking it all
ever he said: well, guess he'll never
be much account again-as dog And
I guess Pemberton's forces will never
be much account again-as an army
"'The delegation began to look around
for their hats before l had quite got to
the end of the story, and l was never
bothered any more after that about SUI
perseding the commander of the Army
of the Tennessee"