Voices from the Past Part 151

Desk

May 1, 1864

Three or four times I have hidden (incognito?), in the wings of a theatre to hear an opera. Tales of Hoffman was performed last week, and I sat in a red leather chair behind the curtains. Back home I used to watch magic lantern shows; they were fine antidotes to melancholy; the Tales of Hoffman minimized the Washington volcano.

I escape some of our war tragedy by reading Spencer. In my bedroom I read till sunup. Every man must skin his own skunk and I skin mine through books. At sunup I can lay down my book and sleep, until someone wakes me.

Tonight I would like to bowl at Caspari's but bowling, because of the war, is off-limits for me. Somebody's afraid a strike might make me laugh. I had a few good strikes before the war.

The White House is asleep. Perhaps I should find a ruler and compa.s.s and attempt to square the circle.

And so to bed...

My wife is one of the loneliest women in Washington.

Her hospitality, her lavish entertainments, have bred enemies and have engendered no rewarding friendships.

Because Mary exceeded her Congressional allotment for essential White House expenditures, the press has attacked her. I have volunteered to pay the bills out of my salary. I have cautioned her against ostentation: "War is no time for preening."

Elizabeth Keckley, her seamstress, a former slave, is her confidante. With three brothers fighting in the Confederate army there are those who accuse Mary of treason. Injustice can strike. And the sad face, the sad thoughts continue. Poor Mary. Sharing intimate emotions with Elizabeth Keckley is a mistake. I do not dare reproach her.

Today's cabinet meeting was a bitter one.

Yes, it is true Mary has relatives fighting for the Southern cause. So has General Grant and other officers.

Does this imply some form of subterfuge? I am well aware of my wife's integrity. I respect her family sympathies.

To impugn the loyalty of my spouse is tantamount to accusing me of treason.

When I learned that a secret committee had been formed to investigate the loyalty of my wife I made a point of appearing dramatically, by a seldom used door to the committee room. I stepped inside without a word-hat in hand.

A dozen men were sitting around a long table. Rain was streaking the windows. No one spoke. I waited. I stared at first one and then the other, searching the faces. I knew most of the men well.

I said:

"I, Abraham Lincoln, President of the United States, appear of my own volition before this Senate Committee to say that I, of my own knowledge, know that it is untrue that any member of my family holds treasonable communication with the enemy."

I walked out.

I have heard no more from that committee or any other; however, my resentment lingers, sticks in my craw. Who could forget such calumny?

I have attended lectures at the Smithsonian Inst.i.tute, where Horace Greeley has been outspoken on the abuse of slavery in our nation. His influence, through his lectures and his a.s.sociates, through his editorials in the New York Tribune, is an influence I intend to curry.

At the Smithsonian he drew me aside and thought it important to inform me that he is a vegetarian, a teetotaler-that he would never stoop to smoking a cigar.

He seemed to be sounding me out by cataloging his qualities. Grasping my arm, he grinned and said: "I want to share this one...since you like stories. I have loaned considerable sums to the son of Commodore Vanderbilt.

Last week the Commodore burst into my office and rapped on my desk with his cane. When I glanced up, he said: 'I will not be responsible for my son's borrowing money from you.' I said to the Commodore: 'Who the h.e.l.l asked you to.' "

At another Smithsonian lecture, I met George Bancroft, our distinguished elder historian. Obviously disgruntled and tired, he wanted to know: Why is General McClellan living in an aristocratic style in an aristocratic mansion? Is it true that John Jacob Aster pays his salary?

When I introduced Bancroft to McClellan, he questioned Mac about the condition of the cavalry: Is it true that half the horses purchased for the army are unfit for service? Was it true that in the District of Columbia, horses have been chained to trees, where they gnawed bark, leaves and branches until they died?

McClellan was not happy with Bancroft. I was not happy with Bancroft and McClellan. Since the General has become known in Washington as the "general most gifted at masterly inactivity," I am seriously considering taking to the field as Commander-in-Chief. My qualification: integrity.

I can not sleep.

In Chicago, one windy night, I attended my first symphony concert. I was in the city working on the McCormick lawsuit. The concert was all Italian. Verdi. I recognized, as I listened to the rich outpouring, how much I had missed during my prairie years. There were no available seats in the theatre, but that was unimportant; I leaned against a wall, in the foyer, hat in hand. Mama would have rejoiced over such music! Why must so many die young and deprived?

Drums pa.s.sing.

The White House

Library

May 5th, 1864

De Tocqueville wrote that there are few calm spots in this country for meditation; yet, in this library, there is a spot. This afternoon it seems to me that these ancient books, with their ancient wisdom, ask what is freedom? Is it something nailed in pain against the morning sky? I think not. Surely freedom is not to limit mankind; it is to share life's values. I remember these lines, learned as a boy, "What avail the plow or sail, or land or life, if freedom fail?" It is our duty to know and a.n.a.lyze freedom, however illusive. I hear it is a flame. Then, if that is true, we must keep it burning in our minds. The altar of freedom is an expression that ill.u.s.trates how sacred freedom is. Freedom, if we can say it briefly, is the dignity of man.

White House

May 9

Can a truly religious person support war, I query?

I am my brother's keeper, I am instructed.

In the core of night, knowing that my countrymen are waging fratricidal carnage, I perceive that I have been nurtured on violence: I countenance war.

As Commander of the military forces, whose intention is victory, I am beginning to see that war is a form of slavery. Generals Grant and Sherman, Generals Johnson and Lee confirm this. So, we, the people, with our armies, fight slavery with slavery.

No doubt others have mulled over these or similar tenets. But I return to the cost, the human cost, the countless lives lost, the shattered families, shattered homes. Our lintels are hung with crepe.

The White House