egated no duties to others which
he could perform himself. His health seemed to bear the strain of his
terrible burdens wonderfully well. There are but few references anywhere
to his being incapacitated by illness. One such reference occurs in
Welles's Diary, dated March 14, 1865: "The President was somewhat
indisposed, but not seriously ill. The members [of the Cabinet] met in
his bedroom." His correspondence was extensive and burdensome, and as a
rule he wrote his most important letters with his own hand, frequently
going to the trouble of taking copies, which were filed with careful
order in a cabinet, the interior of which was divided into pigeon-holes.
These pigeon-holes, as Mr. Brooks tells us, "were lettered in
alphabetical order, but a few were devoted to individuals. Horace
Greeley had a pigeon-hole by himself; so did each of several generals
who wrote often to him. One compartment, labelled 'W. & W.,' excited
much curiosity, but I never asked what it meant, and one night, being
sent to the cabinet for a letter which the President wanted, he said, 'I
see you looking at my "W. & W." Can you guess what that stands for?' Of
course it was useless to guess. 'Well,' said he, with a roguish twinkle
of the eye, 'that's Weed and Wood--Thurlow and Fernandy.' Then he added,
with an indescribable chuckle, 'That's a pair of 'em.' When asked why he
did not have a letter-book and copying-press, he said, 'A letter-book
might be easily stolen and carried off, but that stock of filed letters
would be a _back-load_.'"

A lady who once rode with Lincoln, in the Presidential carriage, to the
Soldiers' Home, gives some interesting details concerning his knowledge
of woodcraft. "Around the 'Home,'" says this lady, "grows every variety
of tree, particularly of the evergreen class. Their branches brushed
into the carriage as we passed along, and left with us that pleasant
woodsy smell belonging to fresh leaves. One of the ladies, catching a
bit of green from one of these intruding branches, said it was cedar,
and another thought it spruce. 'Let me discourse on a theme I
understand,' said the President. 'I know all about trees, by right of
being a backwoodsman. I'll show you the difference between spruce,
pine, and cedar, and this shred of green, which is neither one nor the
other, but a kind of illegitimate cypress.' He then proceeded to gather
specimens of each, and explain the distinctive formation of foliage
belonging to every speci