ion of pontoons. Cannot the enemy ford
the river?

A. LINCOLN.

CONTINUED FAILURE TO PURSUE ENEMY

TELEGRAM TO GENERAL H. W. HALLECK.

SOLDIERS' HOME, WASHINGTON, JULY 6 1863.7 P.M.,

MAJOR-GENERAL HALLECK:

I left the telegraph office a good deal dissatisfied. You know I did not
like the phrase--in Orders, No. 68, I believe--"Drive the invaders from
our soil." Since that, I see a despatch from General French, saying the
enemy is crossing his wounded over the river in flats, without saying
why he does not stop it, or even intimating a thought that it ought to
be stopped. Still later, another despatch from General Pleasonton, by
direction of General Meade, to General French, stating that the main army
is halted because it is believed the rebels are concentrating "on the
road towards Hagerstown, beyond Fairfield," and is not to move until it is
ascertained that the rebels intend to evacuate Cumberland Valley.

These things appear to me to be connected with a purpose to cover
Baltimore and Washington and to get the enemy across the river again
without a further collision, and they do not appear connected with a
purpose to prevent his crossing and to destroy him. I do fear the former
purpose is acted upon and the latter rejected.

If you are satisfied the latter purpose is entertained, and is judiciously
pursued, I am content. If you are not so satisfied, please look to it.

Yours truly,

A. LINCOLN.

RESPONSE TO A SERENADE,

JULY 7, 1863.

FELLOW-CITIZENS:--I am very glad indeed to see you to-night, and yet I
will not say I thank you for this call; but I do most sincerely thank
Almighty God for the occasion on which you have called. How long ago is it
Eighty-odd years since, on the Fourth of July, for the first time in the
history of the world, a nation, by its representatives, assembled and
declared as a self-evident truth "that all men are created equal." That
was the birthday of the United States of America. Since then the Fourth
of July has had several very peculiar recognitions. The two men most
distinguished in the framing and support of the Declaration were Thomas
Jefferson and John Adams, the one having penned it, and the other
sustained it the most forcibly in debate--the only two of the fifty-five
who signed it and were elected Presidents of the United States. Precisely
fifty years after they put their hands to the paper, it pleased
Almighty God to take both from this stage of act