The Caldwell tribune. [volume] (Caldwell, Idaho Territory [Idaho]) 1883-1928, 1889-12-07
LINcoLN's PRIVATE LIFE
HIS Quick Sense Of the Humorous
and Love of a Good Story.

Those of us who knew Lincoln in
his lifetime, says the Chicago Tribune,
ure almost without exception his I'M
! finching partisans. We cannot hear
and see too much of him; all we ask
is, as it true?n We crave more and
more of the naked verify about our
unique hero; good. bad, or Indifferent
we ere not so long as it bears the
dogs ears aud thumb marks of authen-
ITCHY.
Particularly is this true among the
old volunteers. Whatever their minor
preferences-McClellan, Grant, Sher-
man, Sheridan, Thomas-Lineoln was
their first love. They thought they
had much to complain Of in the con-
duct of ''the government" They
knew that shows were poor and slow
a-coming. They thou ght that troops
that ought to have been helping on
the fighting line were kept back about
Washington by cowardly fear for the
personal safety of 1.-THE government. "
They thought that promotion was IN
justly withheld; or still more unjustly
bestowed on General Dick Busteed''
and other political hacks who didnH
know coehorn from suffers MY
Hardest OF all, they thought ''thS ~
eminent" left our boys to die irebel
prisons for the cruel reason that every
exchange gave to the rebel army !
sound soldier and brought to ours only
a dying invalid. ~
BUTT was alW somebody else than
the president blame. Stanton was
disliked, sck despised, and con
gress laz q at; but no one accused
! Abra TLincoln Of having ally pail
in 1doings.
III these loving adherents will hail
)Aerndon's Lincoln" with unmixed,
unbounded Joy. The further behind it
leaves the canons of taste and literary
propriety the nearer it comes to their
point Of view. These ''stories,n as we
all know, were partof Lincoln's nature.
In mis- hands they were trenchant
weapons Of offense and defense; in the
hands Of others they were implements
for opening way to his interest his
sympathy, his aid, and his adhesion to
the views presented to him. Some
time in 1862 d young aide-de-camp,
fresh from the first peninsular cam
paign, called at the Office of Private
Secretaries Hay and Nicolay in the
white house: They were longtime
friends, all young, and, naturally.
laughter soon filled the Office to over
flowing. In the midst of the noise a
side door opened, and away UP near
the top of tho opening appeared the
grave kind, sad face we allsknew so
well. "Well, boys, l heard We laugh
ing pretty loud, and thought I'd like
to come in and laugh too" Sow had
to go over the stories, whatever they
were, and give the great, burdened
soul moments Tightening of its load.
This incident exhibits Mr.. Lincoln S
avidity for the "leetle stories" An
other will illustrate the quick effect
iveness they sometimes had with him.
Dr. Bellows, president OF the glorious
sanitary commission, told the writer
that early in his experience ne found
a dreadful impeachment to all cool
service in the character of the man at
the head of the army medical staff.
He went to to Lincoln to beg for q
change. ''But, DOCTOR" said the
President, elf l remove him then you
have so-and-so. Would that be any
improvement? And after him comes
such another. and so on" "Mr.
President" said the worthy and witty
divine, "that reminds me of circum-
stance of my childhood. My father,
when he opened a barrel of apples,
would always say: Now, boys, eat
the specked ones first and the conse-
quence was that we never got anything
but speckeQ apples"
''Say no more, doctor. Pick out
your good apple and we'll let all the
specked ones go to the-pigs."
Hernion tells some OF the stories.
Others he alludes to with an express,
sion of regret that he must omit them.
All that he says tends to make the
lover of Lincoln love him the more, if
for no other reason than the thought
that from so much that is unworthy
his great soul evolved so much that is
grand, worthy, imperishable.
AS the biography proceeds it natur-
ally runs clearer and clearer of the
grossness of the earlier parts. We
leave the drinking, fighting scenes;
the buffoonery, the lamp coming dog
gerel; and come with relief to the
more human and cizilized experience;
the study of law, the entry into
politics, the gradual tlking on OF polish
by substance firm and close grained
enough to relieve it from every hard
rub.