Francis B. Carpenter, Six Months at the White House

[283] the capture of Richmond, a member of the Cabinet asked him if it would be proper to permit Jacob Thompson to slip through Maine in disguise, and embark from Portland. The President, as usual, was disposed to be merciful, and to permit the arch-rebel to pass unmolested, but the Secretary urged that he should be arrested as a traitor. “By permitting him to escape the penalties of treason,” persistently remarked the Secretary, “you sanction it.” “Well,” replied Mr. Lincoln, “let me tell you a story. There was an Irish soldier here last, summer, who wanted something to drink stronger than water, and stopped at a drug-shop, where he espied a soda-fountain. ‘Mr. Doctor,’ said he, ‘give me, plase, a glass of soda-wather, an‘ if yees can put in a few drops of whiskey unbeknown to any one, I'll be obleeged.’ Now,” continued Mr. Lincoln, “if Jake Thompson is permitted to go through Maine unbeknown to any one, what's the harm? So don't have him arrested.”

I asked the President, during the progress of the battles of the Wilderness, how General Grant personally impressed him as compared with other officers of the army, and especially those who had been in command.

“The great thing about Grant,” said he, “I take it, is his perfect coolness and persistency of purpose. I judge he is not easily excited,--which is a great element in an officer,--and he has the grit of a bull-dog! Once let him get his ‘teeth’ in, and nothing can shake him off.”