Ten Boys from History Part 13

When appealed to in regard to the matter, the President would say:

"Let him run. There's time enough yet for him to learn his letters and get poky." And so the boy followed out his own impetuous desires, and although so backward in regard to books, he understood far more about mechanics and trade than other boys of his own age, and for all his impetuosity and despotism, he had a very tender conscience and a loving nature. A friend of Lincoln's tells of sitting with the President once when Tad tore into the room in search of some lost treasure, and having found it, flung himself on his father like a small whirlwind, gave him a wild fierce hug, and without a word, or even giving his father time to do or say anything, rushed out as impetuously as he had come in. It is needless to say that he was no respecter of persons, young Tyrant Tad; he knew no law, he had no restraint that barred him from any part of the house at any time, but came and went, and did and said whatever pleased his vagrant fancy. Not unfrequently while the President was occupied with his cabinet, Tad would burst into the room bubbling over with some personal grievance which demanded immediate attention or with some pathetic story about a shabbily dressed caller who was being sent away by the ushers, to Tad's great anger. At other times he would become deeply interested in some young person who had come to the President with a request which Tad had heard first himself, and insist on dragging him into the President's presence at once to tell the story, and make his request, and so thoroughly was the President in sympathy with this tender-hearted trait of his son, that he always received such proteges of Tad's with interest and helped them if he could.

Tad had his likes and dislikes, and took no pains to conceal them, and one morning when he broke in on his father's privacy and found with him a Cabinet officer for whom he had no liking, he cried out:

"Why are you here so early? What do _you_ want?" probably to the chagrin of his father, who doubtless talked with him seriously later in the day about showing such discourtesy to an elder.

Quick to take up a new interest, and as quick to throw it aside, one day when the Secretary of War, Mr. Stanton, found Tad fussing around his office, Mr. Stanton, just for the fun of it, commissioned Tad a lieutenant of the United States Volunteers; this excited Tad so greatly that he hurried off and on his own responsibility ordered a quant.i.ty of muskets sent up to the White House at once, and then gathered together the house-servants and gardeners, and organised them into a company, drilled them for service, and then actually dismissed the regular sentries on the premises, and ordered his new recruits on duty as guards. Robert Lincoln, who was then at home, having discovered Tad's scheme, thought that the men who had been at work all day, ought to be free at night, and told Tad so, but Tad would not listen to him, so Robert appealed the case to his father, who only laughed, as he generally did at Tad's pranks, thought the whole thing a good joke, and gave no orders to the refractory young lieutenant. Tad, however, soon grew tired of being on watch himself, and went to bed, when his recruits were quietly relieved from duty, and there was no guard over the President's house that night.

While he sported his commission as lieutenant Tad looked the part, having from some source got a uniform suitable for the occasion, and in that proud costume he had himself photographed to the great delight of his admiring circle of friends.

Tad's tenth birthday was celebrated by a visit which he made with his father and a party of friends to the Army of the Potomac, which was then encamped on the banks of the Rappahannock, opposite Fredericksburg, the visit being made because the President thought a glimpse of the Nation's Chief Executive might put fresh courage into the weary soldiers. The visit was five days long and a more restless member of a party than Tad was, cannot be imagined. By the end of the first day he had exhausted all the resources of the encampment, and begged to go home, but there were any number of reviews and parades for which the President was obliged to stay, and these somewhat diverted Tad, for a handsome young soldier was detailed as the boy's special escort, and a little grey horse consoled him partially for the beloved pony left at home. It is said that those reviews and the part Tad played in them will never be forgotten by the men who saw or took part in them, and this is the way they have been described.

"Over hill and dale dashed the general-in-chief with his company of officers in gay uniforms, sparkling with gold lace, and escorted by the Philadelphia Lancers, a showy troop of soldiers. At their head, seen afar, rose the tall form of Lincoln, conspicuous always by his great height and lean awkward figure, and as they pa.s.sed, ever on the flanks of the hurrying column flew, like a flag or a small banner, Tad's little grey riding coat. His short legs stuck out straight from his saddle, and sometimes there was danger that he would be shot out of his seat at some sharp turn in the road, but much to the astonishment of everybody, the hard-riding reckless youngster turned up at headquarters safe and sound every night, exhausted but flushed with the excitement of the day. Everywhere they went on horse-back he divided the honours with his father, and whenever the soldiers saw the tall figure of their much loved President, and fresh-faced merry Tad, they cheered themselves hoa.r.s.e, but in response to the cheers Tad firmly refused to salute as he was told to do, saying:

"That's the way General Hooker and father do, but I am only a boy," and paid no attention to the notice he attracted.

Even with the excitement of the reviews, so restless was Tad during those days with the army of the Potomac, and so steadily did he plead with his father to go home, that finally to quiet him, the President said:

"Tad, I'll make a bargain with you. If you will agree not to say anything more about going home until we are ready to go, I will give you that dollar you want so badly."

The teller of that story who was on the spot at the time, says, that although having a great desire for the dollar, Tad did murmur a few times after this, and when they were ready to go back to Was.h.i.+ngton, Lincoln held up a dollar bill before Tad, asking:

"Now, Taddie, my son, do you think you have earned this?"

Tad hung his head and said nothing, but the President handed it to him, saying:

"Well, my son, although I don't think you have kept your part of the bargain, I will keep mine, and you cannot reproach _me_ with breaking faith, anyway!" Tad's face showed that he understood the value of that greenback, as well as his father's reproof.

The long terrible months of the War of Secession wore slowly away, now illuminated by the joy of a victory, now overshadowed by the gloom of defeat, and meanwhile President Lincoln was criticised by friends and foes, alike by those who did not understand, and by those who would not appreciate the vastness of the ideal underlying the pain and tragedy of the war. But the President struggled on, wearing out his heart and his strength, but his courage and his faith never failed, and through all the suspense and responsibility of those years, Abraham Lincoln stood firm, Captain of the s.h.i.+p of State, steering her safely into the desired haven.

The war came to an end. The armies of the Union had crushed out the great rebellion. Peace came to the troubled land, and Lincoln felt that he had fulfilled his mission,--that he could now enjoy in unclouded happiness that second term on which he was just entering.

At that time, when though men were jubilant over the end of the great struggle, there was still in some hearts a revengeful spirit towards the conquered, and when in one of his speeches Lincoln asked:

"What shall we do with the rebels?"

A man in the audience cried:

"Hang them!"

The President's elbow received a violent jerk and Lincoln looked hastily down before replying. As usual Tad was close beside his father, and had taken the only means of attracting his attention:

"No, father," he said, "don't hang them--hang on to them!"

"Tad's got it," said Mr. Lincoln, beaming with pleasure at the little fellow's idea. "He's right, we'll hang on to them!"--and that remark of Tad's with the response it brought out, has become one of the most famous memories of Tad.

In another historic scene we find him figuring. It was the night of President Lincoln's last long speech, that of April 11, 1865. News had just come of the fall of Richmond and Petersburg, and the White House was a blaze of lights from attic to cellar, in honour of the occasion, while all over the country a wave of joy swept, for now it was felt that the end of the long struggle was in sight. A great crowd of people had gathered outside the White House and the sound of their cheers and shouts was like the roar of the ocean, and the clamour of bra.s.s bands and the explosion of fireworks, added to the general confusion and noise.

Inside the White House, the President and some friends sat long at dinner, after which the President would be expected 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 ma.s.s 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 the whispered command, and continued to voice his grave and wise thoughts on Reconstruction.

Below was that vast sea of upturned faces--every eye fixed on the face of the much loved President. At the window, his face radiant with patriotic joy stood Abraham Lincoln--that heroic figure, reading the speech which was to be his last word to the people.

Beside him, creeping back and forth on his hands and knees after the fluttering pages, and sometimes lifting an eager face to his father, was Tad, the boy of the White House, and there let us leave him, close beside that father to whom he was both comfort and joy, through dark years of storm and stress. Let us leave Abraham Lincoln, and Tad, his cherished son, together there in the sight of the people to whom they were so dear, before the black curtain of sorrow falls over them, that Tad's merry face may linger in our memory untouched by the sorrow of a nation's tragedy.

S. F. B. MORSE:

A Great American who Invented the Telegraph

On the ocean, homeward bound from Havre to New York, in the first week of October, 1832, was sailing the packet-s.h.i.+p _Sully_, with a long list of pa.s.sengers, among them Samuel Finley Breese Morse, a man so important in the history of America, both as an artist and an inventor, that it is fitting to look backward and see what influences went into the making of such a man.

On the twenty-seventh of April, 1791, the baby with the big name was born in a comfortable home in Charlestown, Ma.s.s. His father was the Reverend Jedediah Morse who was not only popular with his congregation but was the personal friend of General Was.h.i.+ngton and other great men of his time. His mother was the daughter of a Judge, and her grandfather had been president of Princeton college, so the baby who was born on that April day had a rich inheritance of good blood and love of education.

He was christened with the names of his father, grandfather and great-grandfather, but the name was too long for daily use, so he was called "Finley" at home, and in college was given the name of "Geography" Morse.

His birth must have interested a large number of friends, for many letters of congratulation were sent to the proud parents and to others who knew them well. Dr. Belknap of Boston wrote to a friend in New York:

"Congratulate the Monmouth Judge (Mr. Breese) on the birth of a grandson. Next Sunday he is to be loaded with names, not quite as many as the Spanish Amba.s.sador who signed the treaty of peace in 1783, but only _four_! He may have the sagacity of a Jewish Rabbi, or the profundity of a Calvin, or the sublimity of a Homer for aught I know. But time will bring forth all things."

An interesting forecast, that, of the future of Finley Morse! He grew to be a perfectly normal small boy who kept his mother very busy looking after him, but was no more lively and mischievous than other boys of his age. Here is a quaint little note to him from his father's friend, Mr. Wells, written when Finley was only two years old:

"My dear Little Boy,

As a small testimony of my respect and obligation to your excellent Parents and of my love to you I send you with this six (6) English Guineas. They are pretty playthings, and in the country I came from many people are fond of them. Your Papa will let you look at them, and then he will take care of them, and by the time you are grown up to be a Man, they will, under Papa's wise management increase to twice their present number. With wis.h.i.+ng you may never be in want of such playthings and yet never too fond of them, I remain your affectionate friend

Wm. M. Wells.

July 2, 1793."

When he was four years old Finley was sent to a school for very little children, kept by "Old Ma'am Rand". She was lame and could not walk across the room, but she kept a rattan rod by her side long enough to reach any naughty pupil in the room, and the children were much afraid of having this happen.

One day the teacher discovered Finley at the back of the room, busy "drawing" a picture of her with a sharp bra.s.s pin on the s.h.i.+ny wooden lid of a chest.