soldiers in the Union army, and gave liberty to every slave in the land.

Sojourner Truth was introduced to Mr. Lincoln as having" come all the way from Michigan to see you."

"I am very much pleased to see you," responded Mr. Lincoln, rising from his seat, and shaking the old lady's hand cordially. "Take a seat."

Mr. President," replied Sojourner, "when you first took your seat I feared you would be torn to pieces, for I likened you unto Daniel, who was thrown into the lions' den; and if the lions did not tear you in pieces, I knew that it would be God that had saved you; and I said if He spared me I would see you before the four years expired, and He has done so, and now I am here to see you for myself."

"I am truly glad that you have been spared to see this day," answered Mr. Lincoln.

"I appreciate you, for you are the best President who has ever taken his seat," added the old lady.

"I suppose you refer to the emancipation of your race," responded the President.

For half-an-hour the conversation continued with as much cordiality and politeness on the part of the President as he would have shown to the most refined white woman in Washington.

At one time he learned that Frederick Douglas, the distinguished ex-slave, was in Washington; and he sent his carriage to his boarding-place, with the message: "Come up and take tea with me."

Mr. Douglas accepted the invitation; and, for the first time in the history of our country, a coloured man became an invited guest in the Executive Mansion. Mr. Douglas said of that interview, subsequently :

"Mr. Lincoln is one of the few white men I ever passed an hour with, who failed to remind me in some

way, before the interview terminated, that I am a negro."

The children of Concord, Mass., sent a memorial to him, praying for the freedom of all slave children. He replied to it as follows:

"Tell those little people I am very glad their young hearts are so full of just and generous sympathy, and that while I have not the power to grant all they ask, I trust they will remember that God has; and that, as it seems, He wills to do it."

A citizen of Washington entered the President's office one day, and found him counting greenbacks.

"This is something out of my usual line," Mr. Lincoln remarked; "but a President of the United States has a multitude of duties not specified in the Constitution or acts of Congress."

The gentleman responded courteously, hinting that he would like to know what special duty was connected with that pile of greenbacks.

"This money belongs to a poor negro, who is a porter in the Treasury Department, at present very sick with the small-pox. He is now in the Hospital, and could not draw his pay because he could not sign his name. I have been to considerable trouble in overcoming the difficulty, and getting it for him, and cutting red tape, as you newspaper men say. I am now dividing the money, and putting by a portion, labelled, in an envelope, with my own hands, according to his wish." Thus the kind-hearted man had turned aside from grave official duties to assist and comfort one of the humblest of God's creatures in his sufferings and sorrow.

A delegation of coloured men from Louisiana waited upon the President to ask for some additional rights.

"I regret, gentlemen, that you are not able to secure all your rights, and that circumstances will not permit

I wish you

the government to confer them upon you. would amend your petition so as to include several suggestions which I think will give more effect to your prayer, and, after having done so, please hand it to me." "If you will permit me," replied the chairman of the delegation, "I will make the alterations here."

Are you, then, the author of this eloquent production?" inquired Mr. Lincoln.

:

"Whether eloquent or not, it is my work," was the modest reply and the negro took his seat by the President's side, and made the alterations suggested. A Southern gentleman present concluded that Mr. Lincoln did not know that the delegation from Louisiana were "black men."

The rebel government inflicted inhuman barbarities upon Union coloured soldiers at Port Hudson, Morris Island, and other places. The knowledge of the harrowing facts reaching the President, he immediately issued the following proclamation for the protection of coloured soldiers :

"EXECUTIVE MANSION, July 30th, 1863. "It is the duty of every government to give protection to its citizens, of whatever class, colour, or condition; especially those who are duly organized as soldiers in the public service. The law of nations, and the usages and customs of war, as carried on by civilized powers, permit no distinction as to colour in the treatment of prisoners of war as public enemies. To sell or enslave any captured person on account of his colour, and for no offence against the laws of war, is a relapse into barbarism, and a crime against the civilization of the age. The Government of the United States will give the same protection to all its soldiers; and if the enemy shall sell or enslave anyone because of his colour, the offence shall be punished by retaliation upon the enemy's prisoners in our possession. It is therefore ordered that for every soldier of the United States,

killed in violation of the laws of war, a rebel soldier shall be executed; and for every one enslaved by the enemy, or sold into slavery, a rebel soldier shall be placed at hard labour on the public works, and continued at such labour until the other shall be released and receive the treatment due to a prisoner of

war.

"By order of the Secretary of War.

"ABRAHAM LINCOLN.

"E. D. TOWNSEND, Adjutant-General."

Here, again, is proof of Mr. Lincoln's genuine interest in the soldiers. Retaliation was a war measure from which he shrank; his whole nature condemned it. And yet he adopted it, in the circumstances, as a dire necessity, to protect the soldier. In no case would he consent to starve or torture rebel prisoners by way of retaliation; but he did consent to take life for life.

President Lincoln often expressed his admiration of the bravery and loyalty of coloured soldiers, and once he said to Judge J. T. Mills, of Wisconsin :

There have been men base enough to propose to me to return to slavery the black warriors of Port Hudson and Olustee, and thus win the respect of the masters they fought. Should I do so, I should deserve to be damned in time and eternity. Come what will, I will keep my faith with friend and foe."

He was applied to for the pardon of a slave-dealer sentenced to five years' imprisonment and a fine of a thousand dollars. He had served the five years in Newburyport prison, Massachusetts, and was now held because he could not pay the fine. Parties interceded for the prisoner, and bore from him a very touching letter to the President. After having listened to the slave-dealer's advocate, and read his piteous letter, Mr. Lincoln said :—

"That is a very pathetic appeal to my feelings. You

know my weakness is to be, if possible, too easily moved by appeals for mercy, and if this man were guilty of the foulest murder that the arm of man could perpetrate, I might forgive him on such an appeal; but the man who could go to Africa, and rob her of her children, and sell them into interminable bondage, with no other motive than that which is furnished by dollars and cents, is so much worse than the most depraved murderer, that he can never receive pardon at my hands. No! he may rot in jail before he shall have liberty by any act of mine."

Before General Wadsworth was killed in the battle of the Wilderness, he wrote to Mr. Lincoln and inquired "if universal amnesty should not be accompanied with universal suffrage in the event of complete success in the field."

Mr. Lincoln replied: "How to better the condition. of the coloured race has long been a study which has attracted my serious and careful attention; hence I think I am clear and decided as to what course I shall pursue in the premises, regarding it a religious duty, as the nation's guardian of these people who have so heroically vindicated their manhood on the battle-field, where, in assisting to save the life of the Republic, they have demonstrated in blood their right to the ballot, which is but the humane protection of the flag they have so fearlessly defended."

The reverence of the coloured people for President Lincoln was always great, but its climax was reached when the proclamation of emancipation was issued. At one of his receptions, a large number of coloured people gathered about the Executive Mansion, and waited two hours for the crowd of white visitors to pass. At length, they timidly advanced to the reception-room, as if doubting whether they would be welcome, when