ted to make a speech to
the expectant crowd, but he lingered at the table, as though loath to
end its pleasant intercourse, while Tad grew impatient at such a long
period of inaction, and crept away. Soon he was discovered at a front
window, out of which he was frantically waving a Confederate flag,
which someone had given him. The impatient crowd outside, eagerly
watching for something to happen, when they saw the little figure with
the big rebel flag, applauded uproariously, for Tad and his pranks were
one of the features of the White House. But when the dignified old
family butler discovered the youngster he was horrified. After a long
struggle with him which delighted the crowd, Tad was captured and
dragged in, and his flag confiscated while the old servant exclaimed:

"Oh, Master Tad, the likes of it, the likes of a rebel flag out of the
windows of the White House.--Oh, did I ever!"

Struggling out of his conqueror's clutches, Tad rushed tempestuously to
his father to complain about such treatment, but Mr. Lincoln, having
finished dinner, had just stepped into a centre window, from which he
could look out on the great crowd of people below him, and was waiting
for the mighty cheer that welcomed him to die away. Then he spoke, and
as the first words:

"We meet to-night, not in sorrow, but in gladness of heart,"--fell on
the ears of the throng, a mighty hush enveloped the surging mass of
human beings whom he was addressing.

His speech was written on loose sheets of paper, which as he finished,
fluttered one by one from his hand to the ground. The candle which
should have given him light, was not where he could see to read by it,
so he took it from its place, and held it in one hand, while he
continued with his reading, and still the pages fluttered to the ground
one by one.

Tad, meanwhile, finding his father occupied, had seized the chance of
despoiling the forsaken dinner table of all the dainties still on it,
but after this diversion began to pall, he looked about for some new
excitement. Hearing the President's voice addressing the crowd, Tad
crept behind his father, and amused himself by picking up the
fluttering pages as they fell. The President was reading slowly and the
pages dropped too seldom to suit impatient Tad.

"Come, give me another!" he whispered loudly, pulling the leg of his
father's trousers. The President made a little motion of his foot
towards Tad, but gave no other sign that he heard t