rose
slowly, took her calmly, firmly by the shoulders, lifted her, carried
her through the doorway, set her down, closed the door, and went on with
the conference as if unconscious of an interruption.(23) Mrs. Lincoln
did not return. The remainder of the incident is unknown.

The burden of many anecdotes that were included in the propaganda was
his kindness to children. It began with his own. His little rascal
"Tad," after Willie's death, was the apple of his eye. The boy romped in
and out of his office. Many a time he was perched on his father's knee
while great affairs of state were under discussion.(24) Lincoln could
persuade any child from the arms of its mother, nurse, or play fellow,
there being a "peculiar fascination in his voice and manner which the
little one could not resist."(25)

All impressionable, imaginative young people, brought into close
association with him, appear to have felt his spell. His private
secretaries were his sworn henchmen. Hay's diary rings with
admiration--the keen, discriminating, significant admiration of your real
observer. Hay refers to him by pet name-"The Ancient," "The Old Man,"
"The Tycoon." Lincoln's entire relation with these gifted youngsters
may be typified by one of Hay's quaintest anecdotes. Lincoln had gone to
bed, as so often he did, with a book. "A little after midnight as I was
writing, the President came into the office laughing, with a volume of
Hood's Works in his hand, to show Nicolay and me the little caricature,
'An Unfortunate Being'; seemingly utterly unconscious that he, with his
short shirt hanging about his long legs, and setting out behind like
the tail feathers of an enormous ostrich, was infinitely funnier than
anything in the book he was laughing at. What a man it is! occupied all
day with matters of vast moment, deeply anxious about the fate of the
greatest army of the world, with his own plans and future hanging on the
events of the passing hour, he yet has such a wealth of simple bonhomie
and good fellowship that he gets out of bed and perambulates the house
in his shirt to find us that we may share with him the fun of poor
Hood's queer little conceits."(26)

In midsummer, 1863, "The Tycoon is in fine whack. I have rarely seen
him more serene and busy. He is managing this war, the draft, foreign
relations, and planning a reconstruction of the Union, all at once. I
never knew with what a tyrannous authority he rules the Cabinet, until
now. The mos