destroy the entire navy of the North and lay every coast city under contributions, but before it did this, it would destroy Washington and disperse Congress.

In his fright, going over Mr. Welles's head, Stanton actually advised that the Boston and New York ports, as well as the Potomac, should be plugged up by sinking stone boats. The boats were under preparation for closing the Potomac when Mr. Welles, learning it, came to the White House. He found there that Stanton had ordered fifty or sixty canal boats loaded with stone to be sunk in the channel. Lincoln had sanctioned this order. Welles explained to Mr. Lincoln that there was no reason to suppose that the Merrimac could get over the shoals; moreover that as the chief concern so far in the war had been to keep the river open for the sake of the Army of the Potomac, to close it permanently might be much more serious than a visit from the Merrimac. Lincoln's common-sense reasserted itself, and his scare seems to have calmed. He realized at once both the folly and impropriety of what Stanton had led him into. Later he settled Stanton's interference with the navy by one of his incomparable remarks. The President and a party of the cabinet were going down the river a few days after the episode, when they passed the sixty or so stone-loaded boats which Mr. Stanton had ordered out, and which Lincoln's lucky return to common-sense had side-tracked. "That is Stanton's navy," Lincoln said; "it is useless as the paps of a man to a sucking child. There may be some show to amuse the child, but they are good for nothing for service."

He lived in a world of intrigue. That a man who himself was so incapable of intrigue should have been able so to sense what the men whom he gathered into his cabinet, and before whom he was really humble, were about is an unending marvel. But he did understand them, and the legitimate cunning with which he could handle a serious intrigue when it came to the last phase is a pure intellectual joy.

A vivid picture of this is given in the entries in Welles's Diary, tracing the resentment against Seward, which crystallized at the end of 1862 by an almost unanimous vote in the Republican caucus that the President should be asked to remove him. When Seward's friends informed him, he was overwhelmed with surprise. With the fatuity of the overambitious man he had not suspected how obvious his manœuvres were both to his colleagues in the administration and to Washington in general. A goodly body of members of Congress had come to the point where they felt that it was their duty to protest against what they believed was his too great influence over the President. This, says Welles, "was the point and pith of their complaint." Surprised, chagrined, but quite big enough to understand that it was a matter for the President, he sent in his resignation. Mr. Lincoln was perplexed. He felt that the action of the senators who were conducting this matter was an interference with executive authority which must not be countenanced. He told Welles that if it succeeded, the whole government "could not stand, could not hold water; the bottom would be out." But since he felt it his supreme duty to hold everybody to the cause, he was unwilling to antagonize any more than possible the group demanding that Seward should go.

He heard them; he talked with all concerned; he soon discovered that there had been considerable influence exerted against Seward by members of his own cabinet; somebody there had complained of Seward's practice of discouraging regular cabinet meetings and of holding back information from the members when it did meet, of his pose of settling things independently of the President and his associates. Lincoln, in the general airing of things which he conducted, came to see that certainly Mr. Chase and possibly Mr. Stanton had had something to do with stirring up the trouble.

In the excitement some one suggested that the whole cabinet

resign. Welles refused. This was no time, in his judgment, to make things worse by such an exodus, but it was entirely in keeping that Stanton and Chase should bring their resignations. Welles pictures in his diary the extraordinary moment when Lincoln saw with lightning rapidity his way out. Chase had informed the President that he had prepared his resignation. "Where is it?' said the President quickly, his eye lighting up in a moment. 'I brought it with me,' said Chase, taking the paper from his pocket; 'I wrote it this morning.' 'Let me have it,' said the President, reaching his long arm and fingers towards Chase, who held on, seemingly reluctant to part with the letter, which was sealed, and which he apparently hesitated to surrender. Something further he wished to say, but the President was eager and did not perceive it, but took and hastily opened the letter.

"This,' said he, looking towards me with a triumphal laugh, 'cuts the Gordian knot.' An air of satisfaction spread over his countenance such as I had not seen for some time. 'I can dispose of this subject now without difficulty,' he added, as he turned on his chair; 'I see my way clear.'

"Chase sat by Stanton, fronting the fire; the President beside the fire, his face towards them, Stanton nearest him. I was on the sofa near the east window. While the President was reading the note, which was brief, Chase turned round and looked towards me, a little perplexed. He would, I think, have been better satisfied could this interview with the President have been without the presence of others, or at least if I was away. The President was so delighted, that he saw not how others were affected.

"Mr. President,' said Stanton, with solemnity, 'I informed you day before yesterday that I was ready to tender my resignation. I wish you, sir, to consider my resignation at this time in your possession.'

"'You may go to your department,' said the President; 'I don't want yours. This,' holding Chase's letter, 'is all I want; this relieves me; my way is clear; the trouble is ended. I will detain you no longer." "

Nobody understood what it meant. They all went off reluctantly and perplexedly, Chase obviously feeling that the President was going to turn both him and Seward out. He had assisted in preparing a boomerang for himself. This was clear enough two days later when the President announced that Mr. Seward and Mr. Chase had resigned their portfolios, but that he had asked them to continue at their posts. Everybody was taken by surprise. It was not part of the intrigue that Chase should resign, and his friends, who had been insisting on Seward's going, were particularly disgusted.

It was this quality of divining the elements of an intrigue and of almost instantaneously putting his finger on the spring which would loosen it that is most astonishing in a man of Lincoln's temperament and training.

The part that humor played in handling these situations cannot, I think, be overestimated. It was a part of the man, as natural as his melancholy, or his necessity of seeing things clearly and stating them so that everybody could understand. It bubbled up through things like one of those warm springs that one sometimes comes upon in a rugged, rocky field. The way it explained, cleared up, settled, is almost unbelievable. It puts humor higher among human powers than any other exhibit, so far as I know. This is partly because it was so kind; not that it was without satire. There was much, but usually it was a clear, friendly light. It found its expression in common things, the expression of the man to whom all human exhibits, all physical things are clean, to whom nothing is coarse or wrong that is natural.

His zest in things, in everything, one might say, counted for

much in all these difficulties. It is to mistake Lincoln to over-emphasize his melancholy and his travail of spirit. That they were his constant companions is true, but they were not alone, or did they dominate his soul. His enormous interest in life and men held them under. This unflagging curiosity and sympathy made him the most likable of men. Thayer, by his excellent use of Hay's letters and diary, has succeeded in giving a fresh and delightful impression of his lovableness. The very titles by which Hay and Nicolay spoke of the President the "Ancient," the "Tycoon" - hint at their affection. The little descriptions Hay drops of Lincoln taking a hearty part in everyday happenings are particularly revealing. Those of us who have learned our Lincoln from the books have hardly pictured him as Hay does, dishing out oysters at a late informal supper, or as sitting in a private box at a concert with his gay young secretary carrying on a "hefty flirtation with the M girls in the flies"!!

Hay's appreciation of the goodness and bigness of him grew constantly. He realized, if many others did not, the firmness of the hand on the wheel. "The Tycoon is in fine whack. I have rarely seen him more serene and busy. He is managing this war, the draft, foreign relations, and planning a reconstruction of the Union, all at once. I never knew with what a tyrannous authority he rules the Cabinet till now. The most important things he decides, and there is no cavil," and then: "What a man it is! Occupied all day with matters of vast moment, deeply anxious about the fate of the greatest army of the world, with his own plans and future hanging on the events of the passing hour, he yet has such a wealth of simple bonhomie and good fellowship that he gets out of bed and perambulates the house in his shirt to find us, that we may share with him the fun of poor Hood's queer little conceits." It has always been difficult for those unfortunate people who regard education as possible only through schools and