Evening star. [volume] (Washington, D.C.) 1854-1972, 1912-02-11

whom he showed great love and affection
throughout his life.
Another political leader OF Lincoln's day,
still very much alive. Is Chauncey NJ.
Depew, who recalls the war President
thus:
II remember as IL It were yesterday
an afternoon with Mr.. Lincoln. L was
but boy, though secretary of New
York state. Horatio Seymour was the
democratic governor and the legislature
was republican. The soldiers vote was
to be obtained. The republican leglsla-
ture would not trust the governor and
1t devolved upon me the duty Of collect
ing the soldiers vote.
Mr. Lincoln looked up as I pressed
my way through the crowd in his
ception room and said: We'll, Depew,
what can ] do for you? | said: MIR.
President, / do not want anything; / am
in Washington on a mission from our
state to get out from the armies our
New York soldiers vote and | simply
called to pay my respects He said: 1t
is so rare that any one comes here who
wants nothing; please wait and | will
get rid of these peop'e in a few min
utes. The room was soon emDtied, the
faithful Jerry was guarding the door
and on the lounge the tired President
was rocking to and fro, holding his long
knees in his arms and telling story
after story to relieve his mind, and he
said: 'Depew, they say | tell a great
many stories. / think 1 do They say
1 lower the dignity of the presidential
Office by these broad anecdotes Pos
sibiy that is true. But / have found in
the course of long experience that the
plain people of the country. take them
as they are. are more easily reached
and influenced and argued with through
the medium of a humorous illustration
than in any other way
And this very point is illustrated by
Gen. Horace Porter, who says of Lin
coin:
HE did not tell a story for the sake
of anecdote. but to point a moral. to
clinch fact. I do not know a more
apt illustration than that which fell from
his lips the last time I ever heard him
converse. We were discussing the sub
ject Of England's assistance to the south
and how. after the collapse of the Con-
federacy. England would find she had
aided it but little. and only injured her
self. He said:
That reminds me of a barber in
Sangamon county. He had just gone to
bed wien a stranger said he must be
shavea-that he had a four-day beard
and was going to a ball. and that the
beard must come of. Well. the barber
reluctantly got up and dressed and seat
ed the man in chair with a back SO
low that every time he bore down on
him he came near disocating his victims
neck. He began by lathering his face, in
Guiding his nose, eyes and ears; strop-
ped his razor on his boot and then made
drive at the mans countenance as If he
had practiced mowins a stubble field. He
made a bold swath across the right
cheek, carrying away the beard, pimple
and two warts. The mans cheeks were
so hollow that the barber could not get
down into the valleys with the razor and
the ingenious idea occurred to him to
stick his finger in the mans mouth and
press out the cheeks. Finally he cut
through the cheek and into MS own fin
ger. He pulled the finger out of the
mans mouth. snapped the blood off it.
glared at him and said: There, you
lantern-jawed cuss, you've made me cut
my fnger."
Now said Mr.. Lincoln. England will
find that she got the south into a pretty
bad scrape by trying to administer to
her, and in the end she win find she has
only cut her own finger
Copyright. 1872 by John Efreth watkins)