Tombstone epitaph., 1916-02-13

I'll bring Ma, back if you'll agree to marry her"
 Marry her? I'd be delighted said Lincoln. Mrs. Able went away and month or so later she was in Springfield again and she had her sister with her.
 Lincoln went to call When he Mary Owens he gasped. The girl had grown enor- mously She hac become outrageously fat.
 Well. I've brought her back for you to marry according to promise" said Mrs. Able.
 She joking aut Lincoln wasn't sure wheth- it jest whether she was serious and was cloaking her feelings in the light man ner in which she spoke. He called regularly upon Miss Owens and paid to her all the attention he thought engaged man should. It was no; pleasant. however for she was enormous in size To make the situation still more absurd. he was very tail and very thin. The contrast between the two enough to make any person smile, no matter how gloomy he might be.
 Lincoln worried greatly over the situation. He felt that he was in honor bound 10 marry the lady. but he dreaded the taking of such L step
 But while Lincoln had due regard for the sanctity of his promise, implied or otherwise he tried hard to make Miss Owens understand that he not desirable partner for life. He wrote to her some of the queerest love letters that per haps any man ever penned. He told her over and again what a miserable life she would have with him. In one of them he said:
 'I am afraid you would not be satisfied There is a great deal of fourishing about in carriages here in Springfield. which 1t would be your doom to without sharing. You would have to be poor without the means of hiding your poverty. Do you believe you could bear that patiently?
 Another time he wrote to her:
 T know l should be much happier with you than the way I am. provided saw no signs of discontent in you What you have said to me may have been in the way of jest. or l may have misunderstood it. If so. then let it be forgotten: if otherwise. l wish you would think seriously before you decide. What I have said I would most positively abide by. provided you wish it- My opinion Is that you had better not do 1t. You have not been accustomed to hardship and t may be more serious than you now imagine know you are capable of thinking concretely on any subject and if you deliberate matureiy upon this before you decide. then am willing to abide your decision"
 Lovers Tears and Quarreis.
 Evidently Miss Owens had some spirit She sent a reply to one of his letters that stunned him. She rejected him incontinently. and she piqued his pride in doing it. for she told him that he was deficient in those links which make up the chain of a woman's happiness"
 You would not think of Lincoln dancing man, yet he did at times indulge in that pastime. There are some records extant in proof of this. They take the form of cotillion notices printed at the time he was thirty years old and little before his rIeeting with Mary Todd
 Like Mary Owens. Mary Todd a Ken tuckian, and, like Mary Owens, she had a sister S~-~~~s~s~~~~~~s~~~S~~~~~>~~
 LiNcoINs TRUE KINDLINEss
 Mrs. Amanda Kuhn died some months ago in Philadelphia at the age of eghtyfour. During the Civil war her husband was wounded and she went to the hospital at Washington with her only baby to nurse him He recovered but she stayed to nurse others. There Lincoln saw her and was deeply impressed with the woman's devotion to the needs of the injured. Her baby attracted him. and realizing that the child was a burden and anxiety to the loyal nurse. he arranged for its care in the White House while the mother was busy in the hospital That was like him. 1t is merely another story of the many that mark Lincoln as the biggest man the modern world has known