ain that she knew Lincoln. As he did not
at first recognize her, she tried to recall to his memory certain
incidents connected with his rides upon the circuit--especially his
dining at her house upon the road at different times. Then he remembered
her and her home. Having fixed her own place in his recollection, she
tried to recall to him a certain scanty dinner of bread and milk that he
once ate at her house. He could not remember it--on the contrary, he
only remembered that he had always fared well at her house. "Well," said
she, "one day you came along after we had got through dinner, and we had
eaten up everything, and I could give you nothing but a bowl of bread
and milk; you ate it, and when you got up you said it was _good enough
for the President of the United States_." The good woman, remembering
the remark, had come in from the country, making a journey of eight or
ten miles, to relate to Lincoln this incident, which in her mind had
doubtless taken the form of prophecy. Lincoln placed her at her ease,
chatted with her of old times, and dismissed her in the most happy and
complacent frame of mind.

Among the judicious friends of Lincoln who gave him timely counsel at
this important epoch of his life was Judge John D. Caton, who, though a
Democrat, was a far-sighted man who saw plainly the tendency of
political affairs and was anxious for the preservation of the Union. "I
met Lincoln in Springfield," writes Judge Caton, "and we had a
conference in the law-library. I told him it was plain that he had a war
on his hands; that there was a determination on the part of the South to
secede from the Union, and that there would be throughout the North an
equal determination to maintain the Union. I advised him to avoid
bringing on the war by precipitate action, but let the Southerners begin
it; to forbear as long as forbearance could be tolerated, in order to
unite the North the more effectually to support his hands in the
struggle that was certain to come; that by such a course the great body
of the people of the North, of all parties, would come to his support.
Mr. Lincoln listened intently, and replied that he foresaw that the
struggle was inevitable, but that it would be his desire and effort to
unite the people in support of the Government and for the maintenance of
the Union; that he was aware that no single party could sustain him
successfully, and that he must rely upon the great masses of the people
of all part