m till they can be improved. If generals are in the way of
freedom, suspend them too; and more than that, suspend their
money. We have got here a whole army of generals who have been
actually dismissed from the service, but not from pay. Now, I say
to Abraham Lincoln, if these generals are good for anything, if
they are fit to take the lead, put them at the head of armies,
and let them go South and free the slaves you have announced
free. If they are good for nothing, dispose of them as of
anything else that is useless. At all events, cut them loose from
the pay. (Applause). Why, my friends, from July, 1861, to
October, 1862--for sixteen long months--we have been electrified
with the name of our great little Napoleon! And what has the
great little Napoleon done? (Laughter). Why, he has done just
enough to prevent anybody else from doing anything. (Great
applause). But I have no quarrel with him. I don't know him. I
presume none of you do. But I ask Abraham Lincoln--I like to go
to headquarters, for where the greatest power is assumed, there
the greatest responsibility rests, and in accordance with that
principle I have nothing to do with menials, even though they are
styled Napoleons--but I ask the President why McClellan was kept
in the army so long after it was known--for there never was a
time when anything else was known--that he was both incapable and
unwilling to do anything? I refer to this for the purpose of
coming, by and by, to the question, "What ought to be done?" He
was kept at the head of the army on the Potomac just long enough
to prevent Burnside from doing anything, and not much has been
done since that time. Now, McClellan may be a very nice young
man--I haven't the slightest doubt of it--but I have read a
little anecdote of him. Somebody asked the president of a Western
railroad company, in which McClellan was an engineer, what he
thought about his abilities. "Well," said the president, "he is a
first-rate man to build bridges; he is very exact, very
mathematical in measurement, very precise in adjusting the
timber; he is the best man in the world to build a good, strong,
sound bridge, but after he has finished it, he never wishes
anybody to cross over it." (Great laughter). Well, we have
disposed of him partially, but we PAY