peal; 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."

SIGNING A PARDON IN BED.

MR. KELLOGG, representative from Essex County, New York, received a dispatch one evening stating that a young townsman, who had been induced to enlist through his instrumentality, had, for a serious misdemeanor, been convicted by a court-martial, and was to be shot the next day. Greatly agitated, Mr. Kellogg went to Secretary Stanton, and urged, in the strongest manner, a reprieve. The Secretary was inexorable.

Too many cases of the kind had been let off, he said, and it was time an example was made.

Leaving the War Department, Mr. Kellogg went directly to the White House. The sentinel on duty told him that special orders had been issued to admit no one whatever that night. After a long parley, by pledging himself to assume the responsibility of the act, the congressman passed in. The President had retired; but, indifferent to etiquette or ceremony, Judge Kellogg pressed his way to his bedroom. In an excited manner, he stated that the dispatch announcing the hour of execution had but just reached him.

"This man must not be shot, Mr. President," said he. "I can't help what he may have done. Why, he

is an old neighbor of mine; I can't allow him to be shot!"

Lincoln sat up in bed, quietly listening to the vehement protestations of his old friend (they were in Congress together), and at length said: "Well, I don't believe shooting him will do him any good. Give me that pen."

A CHURCH WANTED FOR WOUNDED SOLDIERS.

AT the White House, one day, a well-dressed lady came forward, without apparent embarrassment in her air or manner, and addressed the President. Giving her a very close and scrutinizing look, he said:

66

'Well, madam, what can I do for you?"

She proceeded to tell him that she lived in Alexandria, and that the church where she worshiped had been taken for a hospital.

"What church, madam?" Mr. Lincoln asked, in a quick, nervous manner.

"The

Church," she replied; "and as there are only two or three wounded soldiers in it, I came to see if you would not let us have it, as we want it very much to worship God in."

"Madam, have you been to see the post-surgeon at Alexandria about this matter?"

"Yes, sir; but we could do nothing with him."

"Well, we put him there to attend to just such business, and it is reasonable to suppose that he knows better what should be done, under the circumstances, than I do. See here: You say you live in Alexandria; probably you own property there. How much will you give to assist in building a hospital ?"

"You know, Mr. Lincoln, our property is very much embarrassed by the war; so, really, I could hardly af ford to give much for such a purpose."

"Well, madam, I expect we shall have another fight soon; and my candid opinion is, God wants that church for poor, wounded Union soldiers, as much as he does for secesh people to worship in." Turning to his table, he said, quite abruptly: "You will excuse me; I can do nothing for you. Good-day, madam.”

LINCOLN'S AND BATES'S PRISONERS.

ATTORNEY-GENERAL BATES, who was a Virginian by birth, and had many relatives in that State, one day heard that a young Virginian, the son of one of his old friends, had been captured across the Potomac, was a prisoner of war, and was not in good health. Knowing the boy's father to be in his heart a Union man, Mr. Bates conceived the idea of having the son paroled and sent home, of course under promise not to return to the army. He went to see the President, and said: "I have a personal favor to ask. I want you to give me a prisoner." And he told him of the case.

The President said: "Bates, I have an almost parallel case. The son of an old friend of mine in Illinois ran off and entered the rebel army. The young fool has been captured, is a prisoner of war, and his old, broken-hearted father has asked me to send him home, promising, of course, to keep him there. I have not seen my way clear to do it; but, if you and I unite our influence with this Administration, I believe we can manage it together, and make two loyal fathers happy. Let us make them our prisoners." And he did so.

LINCOLN'S REMARKABLE LETTER TO GENERAL HOOKER.

THE following remarkable letter to General Hooker was written after the latter had taken command of the Army of the Potomac, in January, 1863. Before the President sent it, an intimate friend chanced to be in his cabinet one night, and Mr. Lincoln read it to him, remarking: "I shall not read this to anybody else; but I want to know how it strikes you." During the following April or May, while the Army of the Potomac lay opposite Fredericksburg, this friend accompanied the President to General Hooker's headquarters on a visit. One night General Hooker, alone with this gentleman, said:

"The President says that he showed you this letter;" and he then took out the document. The tears stood in Hooker's eyes as he added: "It is such a letter as a father might have written to his son; and yet it hurt me." Then he said: "When I have been to Richmond, I shall have this letter published.

Sixteen years later, the letter was published. It reads as follows:

“EXECUTIVE MANSION, WASHINGTON, D. C., }

"MAJOR-GENERAL HOOKER:

January 26, 1863.

“General,—I have placed you at the head of the Army of the Potomac. Of course, I have done this upon what appears to me to be sufficient reasons; and yet I think it best for you to know that there are some things in regard to which I am not quite satisfied with you. I believe you to be a brave and skillful soldier-which, of course, I like. I also believe you do not mix politics with your profession-in which you are right. You have confidence in yourselfwhich is a valuable, if not an indispensable, quality. You

are ambitious-which, within reasonable bounds, does good rather than harm; but I think that, during General Burnside's command of the army, you have taken counsel of your ambition, and thwarted him as much as you could, in which you did a great wrong to the country, and to a most meritorious and honorable brother-officer. I have heard, in such a way as to believe it, of your recently saying that both the army and the Government needed a dictator. Of course, it was not for this, but in spite of it, that I have given you the command. Only those generals who gain successes can set up dictators. What I now ask of you is military success, and I will risk the dictatorship. The Government will support you to the utmost of its ability-which is neither more nor less than it has done, and will do, for all commanders. I much fear that the spirit which you have aided to infuse into the army, of criticising their commander and withholding confidence from him, will now turn upon you. I shall assist you, as far as I can, to put it down. Neither you nor Napoleon, if he were alive again, could get any good out of an army while such a spirit prevails in it. And now, beware of rashness. Beware of rashness; but, with energy and sleepless vigilance, go forward and give us victories.

ONE day when Mr. Lincoln was alone and busily engaged he was disturbed by the intrusion of three men who, without apology, proceeded to lay their claim before him. The spokesman of the three reminded the President that they were the owners of some torpedo or other warlike invention which, if the Government would only adopt it, would soon crush the rebellion.

"Now," said the spokesman, "we have been here to see you time and again; you have referred us to the