Produced by Richard Tonsing and the Online Distributed Proofreading Team at http://www.pgdp.net (This file was produced from images generously made available by The Internet Archive) [Illustration] HE KNEW LINCOLN BY IDA M. TARBELL AUTHOR OF “LIFE OF ABRAHAM LINCOLN” [Illustration] NEW YORK McCLURE, PHILLIPS & CO. MCMVII _Copyright, 1907, by McClure, Phillips & Co._ Copyright, 1907, by The Phillips Publishing Company ------------------------------------------------------------------------ _To My Mother_ LIST OF ILLUSTRATIONS _Facing page_ “_Come and set by the stove by the hour and tell stories 4 and talk and argue_” “_Horace Greeley, he came in here to buy quinine_” 16 “_Aunt Sally, you couldn’t a done nuthin’ which would 18 have pleased me better_” “_He just talked to us that time out of his heart_” 24 “_You’re actin’ like a lot of cowards. You’ve helped make 26 this war, and you’ve got to help fight it_” “_We went out on the back stoop and sat down and talked 30 and talked_” HE KNEW LINCOLN “Did I know Lincoln? Well, I should say. See that chair there? Take it, set down. That’s right. Comfortable, ain’t it? Well, sir, Abraham Lincoln has set in that chair hours, him and Little ‘Doug,’ and Logan and Judge Davis, all of ’em, all the big men in this State, set in that chair. See them marks? Whittlin’. Judge Logan did it, all-firedest man to whittle. Always cuttin’ away at something. I just got that chair new, paid six dollars for it, and I be blamed if I didn’t come in this store and find him slashin’ right into that arm. I picked up a stick and said: ‘Here, Judge, s’posin’ you cut this.’ He just looked at me and then flounced out, mad as a wet hen. Mr. Lincoln was here, and you ought to heard him tee-hee. He was always here. Come and set by the stove by the hour and tell stories and talk and argue. I’d ruther heard the debates them men had around this old stove than heard Webster and Clay and Calhoun and the whole United States Senate. There wan’t never no United States Senate that could beat just what I’ve heard right here in this room with Lincoln settin’ in that very chair where you are this minute. [Illustration: “_Come and set by the stove by the hour and tell stories and talk and argue_”]