his opinion was always sought as
that of an impartial umpire, even in cases affecting himself. He
"played the game" in his frontier home as he afterwards played
the greater game of life-or-death at Washington. His rough-hewn,
strong-featured face, shaped by his kindly humor to the finer ends
of power, was lit by a steady gaze that saw yet looked beyond,
till the immediate parts of the subject appeared in due relation
to the whole. Like many another man who sees farther and feels more
deeply than the rest, and who has the saving grace of humor, he knew
what yearning melancholy was; yet kept the springs of action tense
and strong. Firm as a rock on essentials he was extremely tolerant
about all minor differences. His policy was to live and let live
whenever that was possible. The preservation of the Union was his
master-passion, and he was ready for any honorable compromise that
left the Union safe. Himself a teetotaller, he silenced a temperance
delegation whose members were accusing Grant of drunkenness by
saying he should like to send some of his other generals a keg of
the same whisky if it would only make them fight.

When he took arms against the sea of troubles that awaited him at
Washington he had dire need of all his calm tolerance and strength.
To add to his burdens, he was beset by far more than the usual
horde of office-seekers. These men were doubly ravenous because
their party was so new to power. They were peculiarly hard to place
with due regard for all the elements within the coalition. And each
appointment needed most discriminating care, lest a traitor to
the Union might creep in. While the guns were thundering against
Fort Sumter, and afterwards, when the Union Government was marooned
in Washington itself, the vestibules, stairways, ante-rooms, and
offices were clogged with eager applicants for every kind of civil
service job. And then, when this vast human flood subsided, the
"interviewing" stream began to flow and went on swelling to the
bitter end. These war-time interviewers claimed most of Lincoln's
personal attention just when he had the least to spare. But he would
deny no one the chance of receiving presidential aid or comfort and
he gladly suffered many fools for the chance of relieving the sad
or serious others. Add to all this the ceaseless work of helping to
form public opinion, of counteracting enemy propaganda, of shaping
Union policy under ever-changing circumstances, of carrying it
ou