Books: The Life of Abraham Lincoln

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Aid came at once to the President, but the surgeons saw at a glance
that the wound was mortal. They carried him out into the open air. When
they reached the street the question arose, Where shall we take him? On
the opposite side of the street was an unpretentious hotel. A man,
standing on the front steps, saw the commotion and asked what it meant.
On being told, he said, "Take him to my room." It was thus that the
greatest man of the age died in a small room of a common hotel. But
this was not unfitting; he was of the plain people, he always loved
them, and among them he closed his earthly record. He lingered
unconscious through the night, and at twenty minutes after seven
o'clock, on the morning of April 15th, he died.

The band of assassins of which Booth was the head, planned to murder
also other officials. Grant escaped, having suddenly left the city. The
only other person who was actually attacked was Seward. Though the
assassin was a giant in stature and in strength, though he fought like
a madman, and though Seward was at the time in bed with his right arm
and jaw fractured, he having been thrown from a horse, yet strangely
enough he was not killed. The assassin inflicted many and terrible
wounds, especially upon Frederick Seward, his son, who did not regain
consciousness for weeks; but no one in that house was killed.

Surely never did the telegraph hear heavier news than when it flashed
the message, "Lincoln has been assassinated." More than one ex-
Confederate stoutly declared that "when Lincoln was murdered the South
lost its best friend." And thousands of others replied, that was the
truth! At the dedication of his monument in 1874 General Grant gave
utterance again to this thought: "In his death the nation lost its
greatest hero; in his death the South lost its most just friend."

CHAPTER XXXIX.

A NATION'S SORROW.

The outburst of sorrow and indignation over the foul murder of the
President was so great as to lead people to assume that Lincoln was at
all times and universally a favorite. Those who know better have
sometimes thought it discreet to preserve silence. But the greatness of
his work cannot be appreciated at its full value unless one bears in
mind that he had not the full measure of sympathy and a reasonable help
from those on whom he had a right to depend. During the four years that
he was in Washington he was indeed surrounded by a band of devoted
followers. But these people were few in numbers. Those who sympathized
with Fremont, or McClellan, or Greeley, plus those who were against
Lincoln on general principles, constituted a large majority of the
people who ought to have sustained him. All of these factions, or
coteries, however much they differed among themselves, agreed in
hampering Lincoln. For one person Lincoln was too radical, for another
too conservative, but both joined hands to annoy him.

Much of this annoyance was thoughtless. The critics were conscientious,
they sincerely believed that their plans were the best. They failed to
grasp the fact that the end desired might possibly be better reached by
other methods than their own. But on the other hand much of this
annoyance was malicious.

When the shock of the murder came, there was a great revulsion of
feeling. The thoughtless were made thoughtful, the malicious were
brought to their senses. Neither class had realized into what
diabolical hands they were playing by their opposition to the
administration. It was the greatness of the sorrow of the people--the
plain people whom he had always loved and who always loved him--that
sobered the contentions. Even this was not fully accomplished at once.
There is documentary evidence to show that the extreme radicals,
represented by such men as George W. Julian, of Indiana, considered
that the death of Lincoln removed an obstruction to the proper
governing of the country. Julian's words (in part) are as follows:

"I spent most of the afternoon [April 15, 1864, the day of Lincoln's
death] in a political caucus held for the purpose of considering the
necessity for a new Cabinet and a line of policy less conciliating than
that of Mr. Lincoln; and while everybody was shocked at his murder, the
feeling was nearly universal that the accession of Johnson to the
presidency would prove a godsend to the country.... On the following
day, in pursuance of a previous engagement, the Committee on the
Conduct of the War met the President at his quarters at the Treasury
Department. He received us with decided cordiality, and Mr. Wade said
to him: 'Johnson, we have faith in you. There will be no trouble now in
running the government.'... While we were rejoiced that the leading
conservatives of the country were not in Washington, we felt that the
presence and influence of the committee, of which Johnson had been a
member, would aid the Administration in getting on the right track....
The general feeling was ... that he would act on the advice of General
Butler by inaugurating a policy of his own, instead of administering on
the political estate of his predecessor." (Julian, "Political
Recollections," p. 255, ff.).

The names of the patriots who attended this caucus on the day of
Lincoln's death, are not given. It is not necessary to know them. It is
not probable that there were many exhibitions of this spirit after the
death of the President. This one, which is here recorded in the words
of the confession of one of the chief actors, is an exception. But
_before_ the death of Lincoln, this spirit of fault-finding,
obstruction, hostility, was not uncommon and was painfully aggressive.
_After_ his death there was a revulsion of feeling. Many who had failed
to give the cheer, sympathy, and encouragement which they might have
given in life, shed bitter and unavailing tears over his death.

On the other, the Confederate, side, it is significant that during the
ten days the murderer was in hiding, no southern sympathizer whom he
met wished to arrest him or have him arrested, although a large reward
had been offered for his apprehension. As to the head of the
Confederacy, Jeff Davis, there is no reasonable doubt that he approved
the act and motive of Booth, whether he had given him a definite
commission or not. Davis tried to defend himself by saying that he had
greater objection to Johnson than to Lincoln. But since the conspiracy
included the murder of both Lincoln and Johnson, as well as others,
this defense is very lame. It was certainly more than a coincidence
that Booth--a poor man who had plenty of ready money--and Jacob
Thompson, the Confederate agent in Canada, had dealings with the same
bank in Montreal. Davis himself said, "For an enemy so relentless, in
the war for our subjugation, I could not be expected to mourn."

To put it in the mildest form, neither Jeff Davis in the South, nor the
extreme radicals in the North, were sorry that Lincoln was out of the
way. Extremes had met in the feeling of relief that the late President
was now out of the way. This brings to mind a statement in an ancient
book which records that "Herod and Pilate became friends with each
other that very day; for before they were at enmity between
themselves."

On Friday evening there had been general rejoicing throughout the loyal
North. On Saturday morning there rose to heaven a great cry of
distress,--such a cry as has hardly been paralleled since the
destruction of the first-born in Egypt. For the telegraph--invented
since Lincoln had come into manhood--had carried the heavy news to
every city and commercial center in the North. The shock plunged the
whole community, in the twinkling of an eye, from the heights of
exultation into the abyss of grief.

There was no business transacted that day. The whole nation was given
up to grief. Offices, stores, exchanges were deserted. Men gathered in
knots and conversed in low tones. By twelve o'clock noon there was
scarcely a public building, store, or residence in any northern city
that was not draped in mourning. The poor also procured bits of black
crepe, or some substitute for it, and tied them to their door-knobs.
The plain people were orphaned. "Father Abraham" was dead.

Here and there some southern sympathizer ventured to express
exultation,--a very rash thing to do. Forbearance had ceased to be a
virtue, and in nearly every such case the crowd organized a lynching
bee in the fraction of a minute, and the offender was thankful to
escape alive.

Though this wave of sorrow swept over the land from ocean to ocean, it
was necessarily more manifest in Washington than elsewhere. There the
crime had been committed. There the President's figure was a familiar
sight and his voice was a familiar sound. There the tragedy was nearer
at hand and more vivid. In the middle of the morning a squad of
soldiers bore the lifeless body to the White House. It lay there in
state until the day of the funeral, Wednesday. It is safe to say that
on the intervening Sunday there was hardly a pulpit in the North, from
which, by sermon and prayer, were not expressed the love of the chief.
On Wednesday, the day of the funeral in Washington, all the churches in
the land were invited to join in solemnizing the occasion.

The funeral service was held in the East room of the White House,
conducted by the President's pastor Dr. Gurley, and his eloquent
friend, Bishop Simpson of the Methodist Episcopal church. Mrs. Lincoln,
prostrated by the shock, was unable to be present, and little Tad would
not come. Only Robert, a recent graduate of Harvard and at the time a
member of Grant's staff, was there to represent the family.

After the service, which was brief and simple, the body was borne with
suitable pomp and magnificence, the procession fittingly headed by
negro troops, to the Capitol, where it was placed in the rotunda until
the evening of the next day. There, as at the White House, innumerable
crowds passed to look upon that grave, sad, kindly face. The negroes
came in great numbers, sobbing out their grief over the death of their
Emancipator. The soldiers, too, who remembered so well his oft repeated
"God bless you, boys!" were not ashamed of their grief. There were also
neighbors, friends, and the general public.

It was arranged that the cortege should return to Springfield over as
nearly as possible the same route as that taken by the President in
1861,--Baltimore, Harrisburg, Philadelphia, New York, Albany,
Cleveland, Columbus, Indianapolis, and Chicago. In the party there were
three of those who had escorted him to Washington,--David Davis, W. H.
Lamon, and General Hunter.

At eight o'clock on Friday, April 21st, the funeral train left
Washington. It is hardly too much to say that it was a funeral
procession two thousand miles in length. All along the route people
turned out, not daunted by darkness and rain--for it rained much of the
time--and stood with streaming eyes to watch the train go by. At the
larger cities named, the procession paused and the body lay for some
hours in state while the people came in crowds so great that it seemed
as if the whole community had turned out. At Columbus and Indianapolis
those in charge said that it seemed as if the entire population of the
state came to do him honor. The present writer has never witnessed
another sight so imposing.

Naturally the ceremonies were most elaborate in New York City. But at
Chicago the grief was most unrestrained and touching. He was there
among his neighbors and friends. It was the state of Illinois that had
given him to the nation and the world. They had the claim of fellow-
citizenship, he was one of them. As a citizen of the state of which
Chicago was the leading city, he had passed all his public life. The
neighboring states sent thousands of citizens, for he was a western man
like themselves, and for the forty-eight hours that he lay in state a
continuous stream of all sorts and conditions of men passed by
sorrowing.

In all these cities not a few mottoes were displayed. Most of these
were from his own writings, such as, "With malice toward none, with
charity for all;" and, "We here highly resolve that these dead shall
not have died in vain." Two others are firmly fixed in the mind of the
writer which are here given as a sample of all. The first is from the
Bible: "He being dead yet speaketh." The second is from Shakespeare:

"His life was gentle, and the elements
So mix'd in him, that Nature might stand up
And say to all the world, This was a man!"

His final resting-place was Springfield. Here, and in all the
neighboring country, he was known to every one. He had always a kind
word for every one, and now all this came back in memory. His goodness
had not been forgotten. Those whom he had befriended had delighted to
tell of it. They therefore came to do honor not merely to the great
statesman, but to the beloved friend, the warm-hearted neighbor. Many
could remember his grave face as he stood on the platform of the car
that rainy morning in February, 1861, and said, "I now leave, not
knowing when or whether ever I shall return." Between the two days,
what a large and noble life had been lived.

The city had made elaborate preparations for the final services. The
funeral in Springfield was on May 4th. The order of service included a
dirge, a prayer, the reading of his second inaugural address, and an
oration. The latter was by Bishop Simpson and was worthy of the noble
and eloquent orator. It was a beautiful day, the rain which had been
falling during the long journey was over, and May sunshine filled earth
and sky. Near the close of the day the body of the President, together
with that of his little son Willie, which also had been brought from
Washington, was laid in a vault in Oak Ridge cemetery.

A movement was at once set on foot to erect a suitable monument. For
this purpose a few large sums of money were subscribed, but most of it
came in small sums from the plain people. The negro troops contributed
$8,000. The sum of $180,000 in all was raised and a noble structure was
erected. It was dedicated in 1874. The orator of the day was his old-
time friend, Governor, afterwards General, Oglesby. Warm words of
appreciation were added by Generals Grant and Sherman. The former, who
served under him as general and for two terms succeeded him in office,
among other things said, "To know him personally was to love and
respect him for his great qualities of heart and head, and for his
patience and patriotism."

[Illustration: Tomb of Abraham Lincoln at Springfield, Illinois.]

Lincoln was never a resident of Chicago, but he was always a favorite
in that city, even though it was the home of his great rival, Judge
Douglas. It was there he was nominated in 1860, and the city always
felt as if it had a personal claim on him. It has done itself honor by
the construction of Lincoln Park. The chief ornament is a bronze statue
of heroic size, by the sculptor St. Gaudens. The statue represents
Lincoln in the attitude of speaking, and the legend, which is lettered
at the base, is the sublime paragraph that concludes the second
inaugural. The beauty of the park--lawn, flowers, shrubbery, trees--
and the majesty of the statue, constitute a noble memorial of the man
whose name they perpetuate.

CHAPTER XL.

THE MEASURE OF A MAN.

"God's plan
And measure of a stalwart man."--_Lowell_.

Lincoln's physical characteristics have been sufficiently described,--
his unmanageable height and his giant strength. His mental traits have
been treated in chapter xxxv. We now consider his moral qualities, that
is to say his character.

Conspicuous was his honesty. The sobriquet "Honest Abe Lincoln," which
his neighbors fastened on him in his youth was never lost, shaken off,
or outgrown. This was something more than the exactness of commercial
honesty which forbade him to touch a penny of the funds that remained
over from the extinct post-office of New Salem, though the government
was for years negligent in the matter of settling up. In youth he
always insisted on fairness in sports so that he came to be the
standing umpire of the neighborhood. It came out also in his practise
of the law, when he would not lend his influence to further scoundrel
schemes, nor would he consent to take an unfair advantage of an
opponent. But the glory of his honesty appeared in his administration.
It is a wonderful fact that there has never been any suspicion, even
among his enemies, that he used the high powers of his office for gain,
or for the furtherance of his political ambition. When contracts, to
the amount of many millions of dollars, were being constantly given out
for a period of four years, there was never a thought that a dishonest
dollar would find its way, either directly or indirectly, into the
hands of the President, or with his consent into the hands of his
friends. When he was a candidate for reelection he was fully aware that
some officials of high station were using their prerogatives for the
purpose of injuring him. It was in his power to dismiss these in
disgrace,--and they deserved it. This he refused to do. So long as
they did well their official duties, he overlooked their injustice to
him. No President has surpassed him in the cleanness of his record, and
only Washington has equaled him.

His tenderness of heart over-rode almost everything. In childhood he
would not permit boys to put live coals on the back of a turtle. In
youth he stayed out all night with a drunkard to prevent his freezing
to death, a fate which his folly had invited. In young manhood with the
utmost gentleness he restored to their nest some birdlings that had
been beaten out by the storm. When a lawyer on the circuit, be
dismounted from his horse and rescued a pig that was stuck in the mud.
This spoiled a suit of clothes, because he had to lift the pig in his
arms. His explanation was that he could not bear to think of that
animal in suffering, and so he did it simply for his own peace of mind.

But when he became President, his tenderness of heart was as beautiful
as the glow of the sunset. To him the boys in blue were as sons. On him
as on no one else the burden of the nation's troubles rested. It may
with reverence be said that he "bore our sorrows, he carried our
grief." Not only was this true in general, but in specific cases his
actions showed it. When the soldiers were under sentence from court-
martial--many of them mere boys--the sentence came to Lincoln for
approval. If he could find any excuse whatever for pardon he would
grant it. His tendency to pardon, his leaning towards the side of
mercy, became proverbial and greatly annoyed some of the generals who
feared military discipline would be destroyed. But he would not turn a
deaf ear to the plea of mercy, and he could not see in it any permanent
danger to the republic. One or two examples will stand fairly for a
large number. When a boy was sentenced to death for desertion, he said:

"Must I shoot a simple-minded soldier boy who deserts, and not touch a
hair of the wily agitator who induces him to desert? I think that in
such a case, to silence the agitator and save the boy, is not only
constitutional, but withal a great mercy."

Early in the war he pardoned a boy who was sentenced to be shot for
sleeping at his post as sentinel. By way of explanation the President
said: "I could not think of going into eternity with the blood of that
poor young man on my skirts. It is not to be wondered at that a boy,
raised on a farm, probably in the habit of going to bed at dark,
should, when required to watch, fall asleep; and I cannot consent to
shoot him for such an act." The sequel is romantic. The dead body of
this boy was found among the slain on the field of the battle of
Fredericksburg. Next his heart was a photograph of the President on
which he had written "God bless President Abraham Lincoln!"

On the 21st day of November, 1864, he wrote to Mrs. Bixby, of Boston,
Mass., the following letter which needs no comment or explanation:

"DEAR MADAM: I have been shown, in the files of the War Department, a
statement of the Adjutant-General of Massachusetts, that you are the
mother of five sons who have died gloriously on the field of battle. I
feel how weak and fruitless must be any words of mine which should
attempt to beguile you from the grief of a loss so overwhelming. But I
cannot refrain from tendering to you the consolation that may be found
in the thanks of the Republic they died to save. I pray that our
Heavenly Father may assuage the anguish of your bereavement, and leave
you only the cherished memory of the loved and lost, and the solemn
pride that must be yours to have laid so costly a sacrifice upon the
altar of freedom.

Yours, very sincerely and respectfully,
ABRAHAM LINCOLN."

A different side of his character is shown in the following incident. A
slave-trader had been condemned, in Newburyport, Mass., to a fine of
one thousand dollars and imprisonment for five years. He served out his
term of imprisonment, but he could not pay his fine, because he had no
money and no way of getting any. Consequently he was still held for the
fine which he was unable to pay. Some people of influence interested
themselves in the case, and a congressman from eastern Massachusetts,
who stood very near to the President, laid the facts before him with
the request for a pardon. He was indeed much moved by the appeal, but
he gave his decision in substantially the following words: "My friend,
this appeal is very touching to my feelings, and no one knows my
weakness better than you. I am, if possible to be, too easily moved by
appeals for mercy; and I must say that if this man had been guilty of
the foulest murder that the arm of man could perpetrate, I might
forgive him on such an appeal. But the man who could go to Africa, and
rob her of her children, and then sell them into interminable bondage,
with no other motive than that which is furnished by dollars and cents,
is so much worse than the most depraved murderer that he can never
receive pardon at my hand. No, sir; he may stay in jail forever before
he shall have liberty by any act of mine."

It was his magnanimity that constructed his cabinet. Hardly another man
in the world would have failed to dismiss summarily both Seward and
Chase. But, thanks to his magnanimous forbearance, Seward became not
only useful to the country, but devotedly loyal to his chief. After
Chase's voluntary retirement Lincoln appointed him Chief Justice. To
his credit be it said that he adorned the judiciary, but he never did
appreciate the man who saved him from oblivion, not to say disgrace. Up
to the year 1862, his only personal knowledge of Stanton was such as to
rouse only memories of indignation, but when he believed that Stanton
would make a good Secretary of War he did not hesitate to appoint him.
It is safe to say that this appointment gave Stanton the greatest
surprise of his life.

He was always ready to set aside his preference, or to do the expedient
thing when no moral principle was involved. When such a principle was
involved he was ready to stand alone against the world. He was no
coward. In early youth he championed the cause of temperance in a
community where the use of liquors was almost universal. In the
Illinois legislature and in congress he expressed his repugnance to the
whole institution of slavery, though this expression could do him no
possible good, while it might do him harm. When, he was a lawyer, he
was almost the only lawyer of ability who did not dread the odium sure
to attach to those who befriended negroes.

When in the White House, he stood out almost alone against the clamors
of his constituents and directed the release of Mason and Slidell.

Personally he was a clean man. The masculine vices were abhorrent to
him. He was not profane. He was not vulgar. He was as far removed from
suspicion as Caesar could have demanded of his wife. He was not given
to drink. When a young man he could not be tricked into swallowing
whisky. At the close of the war, a barrel of whisky was sent him from
some cellar in Richmond, as a souvenir of the fall of the city, but he
declined to receive it. Wine was served at the table of the White House
in deference to foreign guests who did not know, and could not be
taught, how to dine without it. As a matter of courtesy he went through
the form of touching the glass to his lips, but he never drank. How
widely his life was separated from many of his associates! The
atmosphere of the White House has been sweeter and purer ever since he
occupied it, and this is largely due to the influence of his
incorruptible purity.

In the matter of religion, he did not wear his heart on his sleeve, and
some of his friends have refused to believe that he was religious. It
is true that he was not a church member, but there were special reasons
for this. The church with which he was naturally affiliated was the
Presbyterian. The most eloquent preacher of that denomination was the
Reverend Dr. Palmer of New Orleans, who was an aggressive champion of
slavery as a divine institution. His teachings were feebly echoed in
thousands of other pulpits. Now Lincoln abhorred slavery. He
incorporated human freedom into his religion. The one point on which he
insisted all his life was that "slavery is wrong!" It may therefore be
seen that the church did not give him a cordial invitation. If this
needs any proof, that proof is found in the fact that the pastors in
Springfield voted almost unanimously against him. Even Peter Cartwright
had denounced him as an atheist.

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