thorough, practical surveyor. Once, during those days, I was
in the upper part of the State, and I met General Ewing, whom President
Jackson had sent to the Northwest to make surveys. I told him about Abe
Lincoln, what a student he was, and that I wanted he should give him a
job. He looked over his memorandum, and, holding out a paper, said:

"'There is County must be surveyed; if your friend can do the work
properly, I shall be glad to have him undertake it--the compensation
will be six hundred dollars.'

"Pleased as I could be, I hastened to Abe, after I got home, with an
account of what I had secured for him. He was sitting before the fire
in the log-cabin when I told him; and what do you think was his answer?
When I finished, he looked up very quietly, and said:

"'Mr. Simmons, I thank you very sincerely for your kindness, but I don't
think I will undertake the job.'

"'In the name of wonder,' said I, 'why? Six hundred does not grow upon
every bush out here in Illinois.'

"'I know that,' said Abe, 'and I need the money bad enough, Simmons,
as you know; but I have never been under obligation to a Democratic
Administration, and I never intend to be so long as I can get my living
another way. General Ewing must find another man to do his work.'"

A friend related this story to the President one day, and asked him if
it were true.

"Pollard Simmons!" said Lincoln. "Well do I remember him. It is correct
about our working together, but the old man must have stretched the
facts somewhat about the survey of the county. I think I should have
been very glad of the job at the time, no matter what Administration was
in power."

IT LENGTHENED THE WAR.

President Lincoln said, long before the National political campaign of
1864 had opened:

"If the unworthy ambition of politicians and the jealousy that exists in
the army could be repressed, and all unite in a common aim and a common
endeavor, the rebellion would soon be crushed."

HIS THEORY OF THE REBELLION.

The President once explained to a friend the theory of the Rebellion by
the aid of the maps before him.

Running his long fore-finger down the map, he stopped at Virginia.

"We must drive them away from here" (Manassas Gap), he said, "and clear
them out of this part of the State so that they cannot threaten us here
(Washington) and get into Maryland.

"We must keep up a good and thorough blockade of their ports. We must
march an army into Eas