Voices from the Past Part 144

I have lost that newspaper clipping but I can repeat the tragic news word-for-word, words that shocked our entire country! That left us embattled! Now, I can not, will not, review in detail the war's progress. Must each battle fought on the battlefield be fought again here? I want this diary more man than history. If that is possible.

W. H.

November 29, 1863

Last year, on May second, I began the banishment of international slave trade. Congress appropriated the sum of $900,000 to aid in its suppression. Five ships have been captured at sea and the slaves on board those vessels have been returned to Liberia.

Now, an American ship, the Erie, out of Portland, has been captured off the West African coast, and 893 slaves have been liberated. Captain Gordon has been hung for his crime. To bring even greater pressure and afford greater success, my Secretary of State has negotiated a successful Anti-Slave Treaty with England. On April 24th, 1862, this treaty was ratified by the Senate. It was a distinct pleasure to have the Secretary congratulate me warmly. Our eradication of slave trade has been a marked success.

Henceforth, the blackbirders will find slave trade dangerous and unprosperous, with both the United States and England patrolling the seas.

If I accomplish nothing more than this, my White House term will be worthwhile. Although it is 2 a.m. and chilly-I must celebrate. I have rung the kitchen for a bowl of soup and some crackers.

November 30

Late

It has been difficult to find a few hours alone. To sit in my chair by the fireplace...that privilege comes only now and then. I think I will write an item for the papers, to increase morale, to lessen the influence of detractors. I will begin it...

Let us have faith that right makes might, and in that faith dare to do our duty...

White House

December 5

Tonight I wish I could eat an apple but there does not seem to be one in the White House. Peaches and apples- they are my favorites, eaten in front of a fireplace.

What an appet.i.te I used to have. I used to think that the best food in the world was bread and honey-honey in the comb on plain bread.

I rang the kitchen for a bowl of popcorn.

Pretty soon that Greek G.o.ddess of the Potomac, little Miss Rosie, who is the perfect mulatto, traipsed in, holding the green bowl she loves, balancing it on a silver tray, the tray she thinks belonged to George Washington.

"Heah you is, Mistaaaa President...popcohnnnn, wid plenty a fresh-churned b.u.t.taaaah."

Miss Rosie did a curtsy and smiled and that smile of hers made me happier than the popcorn because it told me that before long the war would be over and people like Rosie would be treated like any white woman.

Sunday

1863

A president is not permitted to have smallpox but I have a mild case, nonetheless. Bed is a poor spot to keep up a diary. What can I say, this Wednesday? That I have been reading Shakespeare? I have not. That I have read the newspapers? I have not. During bouts of fever I let myself return to other days; I see a woman in a log cabin bending over an open fire. I smell bacon frying. Deep in the night I hear a hermit thrush. Its sorrowful sound a.s.sumes great beauty. I have a feeling I am in the wilderness, that wilderness almost Christ-like, benefi- cent.

December 12, '63

Desk

Doc.u.ments. My pigeonholes are bulging.

In a few days I will feel all right.

I miss our green-shuttered house in Springfield. It seems much farther than 1700 miles away, and it seems more than nineteen years since we bought it-back in '44.

We Lincolns were proud of that home. I liked the fireplace in the parlor on snowy nights. I liked the comfortable rockers and the black hair settee. Mary worked hard to sew and tailor the drapes. Her touches were everywhere. Yet, when we moved to Washington, she ruled out everything that was personal.

"Leave things...till we return." Then we rented our place. What will it be when we do return?

And she threw away a pair of my old boots.

Willie, Bob and Ted packed their toys, kites, drums, bats. How Willie stormed when he was told he could not take every single toy.

When Mary and I married, I had three words engraved on her wedding rings: Love is Eternal.

I had not reckoned with death.

Evening

I would like to have opportunities for meditation.

Surely the bettering of life has to come from within. I would like to steal an hour or two every day. The only time I can steal is at night, when the White House is wrapped in memories. Then, candle or lamp beside, a fire in the fireplace, I hunt for inner balance. Perhaps the candles go out. Perhaps the fire goes out. I wait for connections, maybe wilderness connections or connections with the prairie, connections with perceptions that can become new. I may be able to use those perceptions in my day-to-day.

Library

This evening I have re-read some Volney, that old French scholar and traveler; this a.n.a.lysis strikes me forcibly:

Man in his blindness has riveted his own chains, and surrendered himself forever, without defense, to the sport of his ignorance and pa.s.sions. To dissolve such fatal chains, a miraculous concurrence of happy circ.u.mstances would be necessary: a whole nation, cured of the delirium of super- st.i.tion, must be inaccessible to the impulse of fanaticism...this people should be cou- rageous and prudent...

Sound advice for these times! When are we prudent?

What, beside the pa.s.sage of time, years of peace, will evolve prudence? Is war a kind of superst.i.tion? I have thought so. Certainly it is a delirium.

I see the Library has a copy of Volney's Travels in Syria and Egypt. I have asked for a copy.