nt
manner, and then said: 'That is all very well, Mr. Taylor; but there is
one little obstacle in the way that makes the plan impracticable, and
that is the Constitution.'

"Saying this, he turned to his desk, as if dismissing both Mr. Taylor
and his proposition at the same moment.

"The poor enthusiast felt rebuked and humiliated. He returned to the
President, however, and reported his defeat. Mr. Lincoln looked at
the would-be financier with the expression at times so peculiar to
his homely face, that left one in doubt whether he was jesting or in
earnest. 'Taylor!' he exclaimed, 'go back to Chase and tell him not
to bother himself about the Constitution. Say that I have that sacred
instrument here at the White House, and I am guarding it with great
care.'

"Taylor demurred to this, on the ground that Secretary Chase showed by
his manner that he knew all about it, and didn't wish to be bored by any
suggestion.

"'We'll see about that,' said the President, and taking a card from the
table, he wrote upon it:

"'The Secretary of the Treasury will please consider Mr. Taylor's
proposition. We must have money, and I think this a good way to get it.

"'A. LINCOLN.'"

MAJOR ANDERSON'S BAD MEMORY.

Among the men whom Captain Lincoln met in the Black Hawk campaign were
Lieutenant-Colonel Zachary Taylor, Lieutenant Jefferson Davis, President
of the Confederacy, and Lieutenant Robert Anderson, all of the United
States Army.

Judge Arnold, in his "Life of Abraham Lincoln," relates that Lincoln and
Anderson did not meet again until some time in 1861. After Anderson had
evacuated Fort Sumter, on visiting Washington, he called at the White
House to pay his respects to the President. Lincoln expressed his thanks
to Anderson for his conduct at Fort Sumter, and then said:

"Major, do you remember of ever meeting me before?"

"No, Mr. President, I have no recollection of ever having had that
pleasure."

"My memory is better than yours," said Lincoln; "you mustered me into
the service of the United States in 1832, at Dixon's Ferry, in the Black
Hawk war."

NO VANDERBILT.

In February, 1860, not long before his nomination for the Presidency,
Lincoln made several speeches in Eastern cities. To an Illinois
acquaintance, whom he met at the Astor House, in New York, he said: "I
have the cottage at Springfield, and about three thousand dollars in
money. If they make me Vice-President with Seward, as some say they