hant went penniless to bed.

In vain were all attempts to make Tad study. He never had any time for
such dull things as books, when there was all out-of-doors for his
restless self to rove in, and his father did not seem grieved or
worried when tutors came and went, shaking their heads over a boy who
was such a whirlwind of activity that they had no chance to become
acquainted with him, although he was keener than they, and weighed them
each in the balance and found them wanting before any one of them had
been with him twenty-four hours.

When appealed to in regard to the matter, the President would say:

"Let him run. There's time enough yet for him to learn his letters and
get poky." And so the boy followed out his own impetuous desires, and
although so backward in regard to books, he understood far more about
mechanics and trade than other boys of his own age, and for all his
impetuosity and despotism, he had a very tender conscience and a loving
nature. A friend of Lincoln's tells of sitting with the President once
when Tad tore into the room in search of some lost treasure, and having
found it, flung himself on his father like a small whirlwind, gave him
a wild fierce hug, and without a word, or even giving his father time
to do or say anything, rushed out as impetuously as he had come in. It
is needless to say that he was no respecter of persons, young Tyrant
Tad; he knew no law, he had no restraint that barred him from any part
of the house at any time, but came and went, and did and said whatever
pleased his vagrant fancy. Not unfrequently while the President was
occupied with his cabinet, Tad would burst into the room bubbling over
with some personal grievance which demanded immediate attention or with
some pathetic story about a shabbily dressed caller who was being sent
away by the ushers, to Tad's great anger. At other times he would
become deeply interested in some young person who had come to the
President with a request which Tad had heard first himself, and insist
on dragging him into the President's presence at once to tell the
story, and make his request, and so thoroughly was the President in
sympathy with this tender-hearted trait of his son, that he always
received such proteges of Tad's with interest and helped them if he
could.

Tad had his likes and dislikes, and took no pains to conceal them, and
one morning when he broke in on his father's privacy and found with him
a Cabinet officer for wh