y to the
marks of respect some soldiers had come to pay him, who stood in deep
ranks on the grass, that had been top-dressed with compost enough to
cover the whole District of Columbia, as the chairman of the committee
that had to pass the account told me. And once, curiously, I saw _only
his feet_. It was soon after the battle of Bull Run, when some say that
_we_ ran, and some say that _they_ ran. And all was quiet on the
Potomac; but the nation was stamping and champing the bit. And passing
the White House one day, I saw three pairs of feet on the sill of an
open window; and pausing for a moment, a good-natured fellow said,
'_That's the Cabinet a sittin_', and _them big feet's old Abe's.'_ So,
lecturing in Boston not long after, I said, like a fool as I was,
'That's about all they are good for in Washington, to point their feet
out o' window and talk, but go nowhere and do nothing.' When, indeed,
the good President's heart was even then breaking with anxiety and
trouble."

"One day," says Mr. A.G. Riddle, "I called at the White House to present
a distinguished stranger, who had important matters to bring to Mr.
Lincoln's notice. It was evening--cold, rainy, and cheerless. The
Executive Mansion was gloomy and silent. At Mr. Lincoln's door we were
told by the attendant to enter. We found the room quite dark, and
seemingly vacant. I advanced a step or two, to determine if anyone were
present, and was arrested by a strange apparition, at first not
distinguishable: the long, seemingly lifeless, limbs of a man, as if
thrown upon a chair and left to sprawl in unseemly disorder. A step
further, and the fallen head disclosed the features of the President. I
turned back; a word from my companion reached the drooping figure, and a
sepulchral voice bade us advance. We came upon a man, in some respects
the most remarkable of any time, in the hour of his prostration and
weakness--in the depths of that depression to which his inherited
melancholy at times reduced him, now perhaps coming to overwhelm him as
he thought of the calamities of his country."

An old and intimate friend from Springfield, who visited Lincoln at this
period, found the door of his office in the White House locked; but
going through a private room and a side entrance, he found the President
lying on a sofa, evidently greatly disturbed and much excited,
manifestly displeased with the outlook. Jumping up from his reclining
position, he advanced, saying: "You kn