. Lincoln's War Secretary, Edwin M. Stanton, who had succeeded
Simon Cameron, was a man of wonderful personality and iron will. It is
generally conceded that no other man could have managed the great War
Secretary so well as Lincoln. Stanton had his way in most matters,
but when there was an important difference of opinion he always found
Lincoln was the master.

Although Mr. Lincoln's communications to the generals in the field
were oftener in the nature of suggestions than positive orders, every
military leader recognized Mr. Lincoln's ability in military operations.
In the early stages of the war, Mr. Lincoln followed closely every plan
and movement of McClellan, and the correspondence between them proves
Mr. Lincoln to have been far the abler general of the two. He kept close
watch of Burnside, too, and when he gave the command of the Army of the
Potomac to "Fighting Joe" Hooker he also gave that general some fatherly
counsel and advice which was of great benefit to him as a commander.

ABSOLUTE CONFIDENCE IN GRANT.

It was not until General Grant had been made Commander-in-Chief that
President Lincoln felt he had at last found a general who did not
need much advice. He was the first to recognize that Grant was a great
military leader, and when he once felt sure of this fact nothing could
shake his confidence in that general. Delegation after delegation called
at the White House and asked for Grant's removal from the head of the
army. They accused him of being a butcher, a drunkard, a man without
sense or feeling.

President Lincoln listened to all of these attacks, but he always had
an apt answer to silence Grant's enemies. Grant was doing what Lincoln
wanted done from the first--he was fighting and winning victories, and
victories are the only things that count in war.

REASONS FOR FREEING THE SLAVES.

The crowning act of Lincoln's career as President was the emancipation
of the slaves. All of his life he had believed in gradual emancipation,
but all of his plans contemplated payment to the slaveholders. While he
had always been opposed to slavery, he did not take any steps to use it
as a war measure until about the middle of 1862. His chief object was to
preserve the Union.

He wrote to Horace Greeley that if he could save the Union without
freeing any of the slaves he would do it; that if he could save it by
freeing some and leaving the others in slavery he would do that; that if
it became ne