abin.

Mr. Lincoln was sitting under the lamp, slouched down in his chair, in
the position I remembered so well. It was as if I had left him but
yesterday. He was whittling, and he had made some little toy for his son
Tad, who ran out as I entered.

When he saw me, the President rose to his great height, a sombre,
towering figure in black. He wears a scraggly beard now. But the sad
smile, the kindly eyes in their dark caverns, the voice--all were just
the same. I stopped when I looked upon the face. It was sad and lined
when I had known it, but now all the agony endured by the millions, North
and South, seemed written on it.

"Don't you remember me, Major?" he asked.

The wonder was that he had remembered me! I took his big, bony hand,
which reminded me of Judge Whipple's. Yes, it was just as if I had been
with him always, and he were still the gaunt country lawyer.

"Yes, sir," I said, "indeed I do."

He looked at me with that queer expression of mirth he sometimes has.

"Are these Boston ways, Steve?" he asked. "They're tenacious. I didn't
think that any man could travel so close to Sherman and keep 'em."

"They're unfortunate ways, sir," I said, "if they lead you to misjudge
me."

He laid his hand on my shoulder, just as he had done at Freeport.

"I know you, Steve," he said. "I shuck an ear of corn before I buy it.
I've kept tab on you a little the last five years, and when I heard
Sherman had sent a Major Brice up here, I sent for you."

What I said was boyish. "I tried very hard to get a glimpse of you
to-day, Mr. Lincoln. I wanted to see you again."

He was plainly pleased.

"I'm glad to hear it, Steve," he said. "Then you haven't joined the ranks
of the grumblers? You haven't been one of those who would have liked to
try running this country for a day or two, just to show me how to do it?"

"No, sir," I said, laughing.

"Good!" he cried, slapping his knee. "I didn't think you were that kind,
Steve. Now sit down and tell me about this General of mine who wears
seven-leagued boots. What was it--four hundred and twenty miles in fifty
days? How many navigable rivers did he step across?" He began to count on
those long fingers of his. "The Edisto, the Broad, the Catawba, the
Pedee, and--?"

"The Cape Fear," I said.

"Is--is the General a nice man?" asked Mr. Lincoln, his eyes twinkling.

"Yes, sir, he is that," I answered heartily. "And not a man in the army
wants anything when he is around. You